


Mortal Obsessions

by Renai_chan



Category: Kingsman: The Secret Service (2015)
Genre: Blood and Gore, Dark Kingsman Block Party, Fix-It of Sorts, M/M, Murder, Obsession, Possessive Harry, Stalking, Tags will be updated as the fic moves along, Torture, dubcon sex, evil!Harry, personality changes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-06
Updated: 2016-11-28
Packaged: 2018-05-18 08:17:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 8
Words: 27,357
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5912077
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Renai_chan/pseuds/Renai_chan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry doesn't die in Kentucky, but he doesn't truly survive either. What returns to England is merely a dark shadow of the agent they once knew with an obsession for the agent that replaced him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> It's Saturday where I am, so let me be the first to post for the block party ^^
> 
> This is one of my two (at the least; we'll see how many fics we can fit in in the given timeframe) planned submissions for the [Dark Kingsman Block Party](http://dark-kingsman-block-party.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr. This one is the plottier story (gasp!), so don't expect too much smut (double gasp! What is happening to me? I don't write for plot!), but of what I will provide, I hope to sate your need ^^
> 
> I have an affinity for dark fics. Like, I would write a fic for each of the prompts posted if only I had the time and ideas to support it; _nothing_ is off limits for me :) But I _am_ kinda worried that it won't be as twisted as everyone (or even I) expect it to be, especially when the prompts on Tumblr are fantastically intense ^^ I feel like I'm overtagging my fic and might not live up to expectations, but I dunno. We'll see how it works out. Fingers crossed ^^

They say just before you die, your whole life flashes before your eyes in a haze of bright light. 

They say it's God or Allah or whichever deity you choose to place your beliefs in reviewing your accomplishments and your failures in life before the judgement of your fate in the afterlife. 

They say, whether it affects you positively or negatively, it's a stupendous thing to experience, unlike anything else a person could ever come to know.

Harry knew it was all utter bullshit because at the very precipice of death, with blood and gore and possibly part of his brain leaking out of a bullet hole at the side of his head, only one thought came into his quieted mind. 

It throbbed in his head like his brain had turned into his heart, a black haze framing the image in his mind, threatening to engulf it the moment Harry lost the strength to hold it at bay. 

It made his heart stutter in his chest and blood recede from his extremities (Although more likely, it was simply due to shock and blood loss from the gunshot wound, but where was the poetry in that?). 

The thought that crossed the most prolific Kingsman agent’s mind in his last conscious moments was the single image of green eyes filled with shame and apology, and afterwards, hurt, and as Harry’s last breath escaped him, a name quickly followed thereafter. 

_Eggsy_.

They say those that have the good fortune of returning from the edge of life return as changed men.

Well.

Maybe that one wasn’t _complete_ bullshit.


	2. Moving On

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A second chapter at the same time because the first one doesn't count.

There was nothing special about the door handle he held on his way into the pub. 

In fact, it was quite the opposite: mundane, common, incredibly familiar. So was the darkened street around him, so were the few people that passed him by with hardly a second glance, so were the sounds and smells of the pub coming from beyond the door. 

Mundane. Common. Familiar.

Nothing which should have made this the ordeal Eggsy felt it to be.

But then again, he hadn’t been back to the Black Prince since after V-Day when he made it perfectly clear to Dean and his crew exactly why he should stay the _fuck_ away from him and his mum and his Daisy. A solid year since that day, a year since he’d become a Kingsman and saved the world a few more times, a year since he’d carved himself and his family a better life in a better place.

This place, this _life_ was no longer familiar to Eggsy. Even the clothes he wore--[Armani trackies](http://images.asos-media.com/inv/media/1/7/7/4/5704771/black/image1xxl.jpg) and gaudy [Giuseppe Zanotti trainers](https://cdna.lystit.com/photos/3a3f-2016/01/01/giuseppe-zanotti-kanye-wing-high-top-sneaker-product-0-921566202-normal.jpeg)\--were merely an expensive approximation of his old style in an attempt to assimilate into an unfamiliar past. Nowadays, he much preferred decent jeans and a nice jacket rather than the latest Jeremy Scott ensemble, though he still wouldn’t say no to a wicked pair of trainers.

So yeah, maybe there was reason for this to be an ordeal.

For a split second, he hesitated, thinking that maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all. He’d been away on a three-month-long mission and was looking forward to surprising Ryan and Jamal with his return, but maybe he could simply call them over to his flat, and they could make a night of it. God knew they were there pretty much every weekend anyway (while he was gone even, but he didn’t mind in the _least_. He liked that they felt free to do so because they were brothers to him, and nothing less).

But he was here, and he was dressed for the occasion, and more importantly, _he had no one to fear_ inside or outside the pub. He’d once faced down an entire private army in Bolivia with no one but Elaine in his ear; Rottweiler was a speck on his shoe in comparison.

So with a deep breath, he pushed the door open and stepped through.

The pub was the same as it had always been: a little dark, a little dingy, and filled with drunken louts. He found Ryan and Jamal talking by the window booth behind the one currently occupied by Rottie, Boxer, and Pitbull. None of them paid attention to the door opening--hardly anyone ever did because people came and went so very often that there was no point in keeping track--but when Eggsy stepped through, one by one, they seemed to recognize him, and their conversations hushed.

Ryan and Jamal had told him the estates had been abuzz for _weeks_ following his confrontation with Dean and subsequent hauling ass out of the area with Michelle and Daisy, and it had been the first time he’d _really_ been back just to hang out, so he understood their curiosity and so he simply ignored them. He creeped up instead to Ryan and Jamal’s table, intending to scare them a little, except that Jamal glanced his way first and caught sight of him.

“FAM!!” he exclaimed in delighted surprise, shooting to his feet and holding his arms open to Eggsy. Eggsy laughed in true joy and rushed forward to give him a tight hug, following it up with one for Ryan. They did their stupid little handshake ritual because that’s what they _did_ , and then Eggsy slid into the booth beside Ryan, sprawling himself out like he hadn’t been reconsidering this just moments ago.

He could feel the three dogs watching him closely, albeit warily as well, but Eggsy ignored them. Twice now, they’d been subjected to the wrath of a Kingsman--though they didn’t know exactly the significance of a man in a suit--Eggsy knew they’d be wary of experiencing it a third time from him.

“When d'ya get back, bruv?” Ryan asked, shoving at him lightly.

Eggsy shoved him back for the hell of it. “Jus' this morning; ‘ad t’ wrap up some shit at work then I took me mum and Dais out fer lunch. ‘Ad a bit of a kip ‘fore I came ‘ere.” Of course, by ‘wrap shit up’ he actually meant have Medical dress the stab wound he’d sustained yesterday at the culmination of his mission because Kingsman suits were bulletproof but still not bladeproof. Really. R&D needed to sort that shit out.

“Yeah? Wot’s all this then?” Jamal asked jerking his chin at Eggsy, and the agent realized he was referring to his outfit. He grinned and splayed himself out further, waggling his eyebrows and owning it. “Thought you’d grown outta trackies and shit. Left us chavs behind on your way ta joinin’ them beautiful people ov Mayfair.”

“Yeah,” Ryan goaded. “Wot ‘appened ta (and here, he switched to a ridiculous snooty voice) ‘Oxfords, not brogues. Words to live by, gents’?” His approximation of Eggsy’s posh accent was fucking _appalling_ was what it was, and he deserved the bruised elbow he got when Eggsy shoved him over. He didn’t seem to mind though, only cackling when he pushed himself upright.

“Nah, see, Ry,” Jamal cut it, giggling as he spoke. “See, ‘e’s wearing _Armaaani_ , so it counts as posh wear, don’ it?” Eggsy balled up the nearest napkin and threw it at the middle of Jamal’s forehead. It hit dead on, but Eggsy didn’t expect any less.

“Shut it, you,” he said with a laugh, and then stood. “I’ll go get us a round.”

“Start up a tab, won’t ya? I ain’t wastin’ my measly pay when yer makin’ bank, bruv,” Ryan laughed, so Eggsy chucked a balled-up napkin at him too.

“Arse,” he said, but did so anyway because there was little he wouldn’t do if they asked. 

Rottie’s eyes--and most of the pub’s--followed him as he made his way to the bar and back, but now that he had Ryan and Jamal with him, he didn’t care about all the extra attention.

Conversation went on as it always did: bit of friendly banter, inquiries into his work which he made sure to answer carefully, asking after friends and families, and, eventually, love lives.

“Wotever ‘appened ta that bloke you wos datin’?” asked Jamal. “Wotsit? Gregory? Grant?”

“It wos 'Grayson,' mate,” Ryan corrected.

Eggsy shrugged and sipped at his fourth Guinness of the night. “Broke it off before I left,” he answered as he set the glass back down. He shrugged again. “Long distance relationships ain’t really my thing.”

“Yeah, but now that yer ‘ome, you can pick up where you left off, yeah?” Jamal pointed out. “‘E wos right fit, that one. Even I could see that, and I’m fuckin’ _straight_ , bruv.”

Eggsy scrunched up his face and drew out his answer. “Yeaaaaahhh… But I dunno, it just… din’t feel right,” was the only real answer he could give because, honestly? Even he didn’t know why he didn’t want to get back with Grayson. The man was smart, charming, funny. Fit too, as Jamal pointed out, and even though he was posh as all fuck--he was Roxy’s acquaintance--he seemed to genuinely like Ryan and Jamal. 

Well, he _knew_ why he didn’t want Grayson, but he wasn’t going to admit that out loud.

Of course, they had only been dating for about three weeks and had only once hung out with his mates, so Eggsy wasn’t singing his praises just yet. “Might see what Grindr can churn out before I go about makin' commitments.”

“You got a problem, mate,” Ryan interjected. Eggsy lifted an eyebrow at him. “I mean, you’ve been wiv four people--four potential long-term relationship blokes and birds 'oo were all excellent in one way or another--but as soon as the ‘relationship’ word starts gettin' thrown around, yer suddenly ‘busy with your career’ or ‘not into long-distance relationships.’ Bruv, if a person even 'alf as fit as Emmy wos showed me the slightest bit of interest, I’d be down on one knee in the blink ov an eye.”

Eggsy made a sound of disagreement, but Jamal nodded, so he glared at Jamal too. “Wot? Yer sayin’ I have _commitment issues_?” he asked. “Are we--no, wait. We’re really talkin’ about this. _Really_?”

Jamal shrugged. “We’re just sayin’, bruv. You’ve gotten rid o’ Dean, you’ve put yer mum and sis up in a nice place, got them settled in, give them a good life. Maybe it’s time you found someone t’ take care o’ _you_.”

Eggsy hummed a non-committal answer as he threw back his beer. He didn’t need anyone to take care of him. He never did then, and he certainly didn’t need it now. Taking care of shit was his job, and he was _good_ at it.

Ryan seemed to realize the shift in his mood, so like a good mate, he switched topics. “Oi, you remember Constable Ineson?” Eggsy frowned and shook his head, so Ryan started flapping his hands about like that would help in anyway. “You knowww…” he tried. “That bobby from 'Olborn? Tried ta get you ta grass on us after we nicked Rottie’s car just before you up and disappeared on us fer an _'ole fuckin’ year_?”

“Oh!” Eggsy exclaimed. “Oh, right. That guy. Wot about ‘im?”

“While you was in Singapore las’ month, ‘e went an’ got ‘imself offed by the mob, apparently,” Ryan answered. Eggsy’s eyebrows lifted in surprise, but not alarm. It must have been an isolated incident or else Arthur would have had him lock it down (or if he wasn’t put on the case, he would have heard about it anyway from Bors who was a horrid gossip). “I ‘appened by the side street where ‘e was found while the filth were there; lotsa cars, sirens all around. ‘Course I din’t see the body or nothin,’ but I later ‘eard ‘bout it from one o’ me mates at work. Said ‘e was all cut up like ‘e was tortured or summink. It was pretty gruesome, ‘e said”

Eggsy frowned. Kingsman didn’t deal with generic crime no matter how heinous said crime was--they weren’t policemen after all--but maybe he’d mention it to Merlin when he saw him.

“Huh, poor guy,” was what he contributed to the discussion instead.

Their conversation after that drifted to stories of their past and quickly degenerated into taking the piss out of each other for their boyhood fuck ups while they easily made their way through what Eggsy swore was an entire keg of beer. 

He ended up staggering home, shitfaced beyond comprehension, and managed to do so only because of a drunken call, an _amazing_ best friend, and a Kingsman cab. 

Tomorrow, he’d wake up with an excruciating hangover made even worse by an _awful_ best friend who’d hustle him into the shower and into the only clothes that were still hanging in the wardrobe instead of crumpled up on the floor only because he’d never in a million years wear them, then whisk him away to the mansion and leave him to cry over paperwork.

All in all, he’d call it a successful night.

…………… 

“What the…?” came Elaine’s startled remark over Eggsy’s glasses right as he was running through a maze of hallways, being chased by a handful of armed bodyguards. It was highly alarming considering the situation he was in and Eggsy felt like she needed to elaborate.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, breathless from his run. A round of SMG shots rang out from behind him, and he dived for cover behind a giant vase, avoiding them by a hairsbreadth. He returned volley with two shots of his own, missing the security personnel in front but catching another in the arm. It gave him just enough time to start running again, leaving them all behind as he jumped over a stair banister and disappeared through a set of doors. 

He took a moment to regroup behind a pillar and waited for further instructions from his handler, but when she remained silent, he asked, “Want to tell me what’s going on?” He started moving once more, wary of staying still for more than ten seconds when men were still after him. He could _hear_ her frustration over the comm almost as well as he could hear her frantic typing, but he couldn’t continue running blind.

“ _Fuck_!” she finally exclaimed. “I’m sorry, but I’ve lost all visual, Galahad. No infrared either. You’re on your own with the lackeys, I’m afraid. Take a right there.” Eggsy swore at the bad news, but it wasn’t a _huge_ deal; he could handle this. 

He took the next right as instructed with his gun outstretched, but thankfully encountered no one. “Another right at the end there, Galahad. Be careful, I remember two guards stationed at the door just to the right. It should be worth something to look into if you can manage it.” 

Eggsy nodded and let out a slow breath right before he turned the corner in question. He uncurled his arm as he rounded the bend, quickly aiming for the guards at the aforementioned door on the right.

And found no one.

“There’s no one here,” he said though Elaine would have been very well able to see that. He was half relieved to not have to contend with them, but also half baffled. Once glance down at the carpeting told him there _had_ been guards stationed here not long ago, but they were… dragged away? 

He spent another second staring at the pair of track marks, but the sound of movement from down the hall had him ducking into the doors, neither of which were locked.

It was a library, quite a small one, too, but upon inspection, Eggsy found that it wasn’t to be poo pooed. Several first editions were displayed in glass cases, and in the shelves were limited editions, autographed books, handwritten ones. It was quite the impressive, if modestly sized collection, but not what Eggsy was here for.

“Anything in here?” he asked, looking around to give Elaine a chance to sweep the room.

It took her a moment, but she finally said, “No, nothing. Go--”

“Wait,” Eggsy cut in and strode over to the desk. There was a single clean, white sheet of paper on it which, considering all the antiques in the room, seemed to be highly suspicious. He picked it up and found a series of combinations of letters and numbers. “Any idea what these are?” he asked. Elaine was silent for a moment.

“Oh,” she remarked after a moment, clearly stunned.

“What are they?” Eggsy asked again.

“Passwords,” she answered, her voice still wary. “To the files you acquired. I was going to have the team here decrypt them, but…” She trailed off.

But why were important passwords kept out in the open where anyone who could get past those guards could see them?

“I think you should head back, Galahad. I’ll have Merlin check to see if we aren’t being baited,” Elaine said. Her voice was once again even and steady as she guided him out of the building and to his extraction point.

…………… 

“So what’s wrong with Grayson?”

“There ain't nothin' _wrong_ wiv 'im, Rox,” Eggsy sighed, throwing an arm over his face and considering tossing his glasses out the window. He was lying on his bed where he’d thrown himself out of complete frustration as he was in the middle of dressing up because Roxy may just be the most perfect human alive, but she was also incredibly annoying when she wanted to be. 

He had five minutes, _five_ , to get out of the house before he was late for his meet up with a promising Grindr shag and here she was interrogating him to the end of his wits in her twisted way of expressing her disapproval all because she was rooting for Grayson. Over the comms while she was on a mission no less because let it not be said that Roxy couldn’t multitask.

“So there’s nothing wrong with him and you’ve got nothing going on with anyone else and he’s willing to consider another date even after you unceremoniously dumped his arse before you left for Singapore. Then why _won’t_ you?” she demanded yet fucking _again_.

“She’s right, you know. I’ve seen this Grayson guy--the bloke’s a _babe_ ,” chirped in her handler who had spent the last fifteen minutes laughing his ass off.

“Fuck off, Ban,” Eggsy snapped, but Ban only laughed, so Eggsy ignored him. “I told ya, Rox, I don’t think it’s gonna work out. ‘E could be the king o’ Sweden fer all I care, and I still wouldn’t ‘rekindle’ wiv ‘im. Now fuck off; I got someone t' do.”

“That’s not polite,” she reprimanded, but didn’t fuck off like he was hoping she would. She instead wheedled, “Come on, Eggs. You know I only want you to be happy. You and Grayson _had_ something; you can’t deny that.”

“I don’t need a boyfriend t’ make me ‘appy,” Eggsy grumbled as he pulled on his socks and shoes. “I got you and mum and Dais and Ry and Jamal and everyone else at Kingsman t’ make me ‘appy.” Then he added cheekily, “I mean, if you’d _put out_ every once in a while, then I wouldn’t need Grindr either.”

Roxy snorted derisively, and Ban burst into laughter. Eggsy grinned smugly to himself. 

The other agent responded tartly, “I’ve seen your flat, you slob. No fucking way I’m putting out for you if _that’s_ what I have to go home to.”

"We can always do it at your place," Eggsy teased. Roxy couldn't see, but he waggled his eyebrows anyway. He headed out the door and stood by the elevator (with his mobile pressed to his ear so he didn't look like a crazy person to the other resident also waiting beside him) while he continued to say, "C'mon, I'll make it worth your while. I once made a bird at me school cry while I shagged ‘er. Full out sobbin,' you know? Tears and snot and all; the works." He put on a falsetto. "'Oh, Eggsy! Oh, yes, there! Harder, _harder_!'" 

The posh grandaddy beside him leveled a glare at him, but he was already roaring with laughter (as was Ban) when Roxy groaned in disgust, "Ugh, you're a pig, Unwin. Fine, no to Grayson then. But I do have this one friend--"

"I’m gettin’ in the elevator now, Rox, I’m afraid yer breakin’ up!” Eggsy said loudly over her.

“Oh shut up, Unwin, the comms don’t break up in elevators.”

To annoy Roxy (and to let her know he wasn’t alone), Eggsy told the old man ever so sweetly in his poshest voice, “Yes, please, good sir. Ground level for me as well,” even when the man had given no indication of offering to push any button for him.

Roxy was warning him, “Don’t you dare put this down, Eggsy, or I _swear_. I am not done--” 

Eggsy gleefully hung up on her. He gave the man a knowing look and remarked conspiratorially, “Women.” The man only turned his back to Eggsy and huffed away when the doors opened up on the ground floor.

Eggsy was beyond getting offended by people who didn’t matter, so he only grinned at his own joke and made his way to the meet up point with his date: a big black American called Marcus with fantastic arms and a huge… ahem, _personality_.

He could be a regular, Eggsy decided, when Marcus had him pinned up against the wall of the elevator, his hands on Eggsy’s arse and Eggsy’s legs around his waist. He’d already seen Marcus’s cock (dick pics were a glorious thing), and was rather eager to climb onto it as soon as he could.

The elevator pinged, and Eggsy slapped Marcus’s shoulder to let him down when the man showed no signs of slowing. He giggled when the bigger man nipped playfully at his neck and made sure to deliberately sway his hips as he walked ahead of him. He was pressed chest first up against the door when Marcus cornered him there, pressing kisses to his neck, so Eggsy wriggled around and procured himself a proper one as he twisted open the doorknob behind him.

He wasn’t the least bit uncoordinated as to stumble through the doorway as he walked backwards through it, easily dragging Marcus along with a hand on the neck of his shirt and their mouths still attached. Inside, he reluctantly pried himself away from the mouth still eagerly devouring his and told his date, “Go sit down. I’ll get us something t’ drink.”

Before he could move too far away, Marcus reeled him back in by his wrist and pressed their foreheads together. “Not too long, baby. I want that posh British ass of yours grinding on my lap as soon as possible,” he murmured in a teasing whisper while he groped said arse in a tight grip and _ground_ their cocks together. A gasping moan left Eggsy’s mouth as electricity _zinged_ through him. He panted into a few more dry thrusts before he found the will to pull himself away and into the kitchen.

Jesus _fuck_ but this was going to be a fantastic night.

He threw open the fridge door and examined its contents. He knew he didn’t have a lot of stuff in it, but he remembered he should have half a bottle of--

“Huh,” he remarked as he pulled out a brand new Sauvignon and stared at the label in confusion. 

When did he buy that? 

He tipped it up into the light and checked the vintage.

Not cheap then. Maybe Roxy left it here at some point.

Shrugging, he grabbed two wine glasses and put them down on the counter before stealing briefly into the adjoining loo for a piss, a wash, and a bit of preening in front of the mirror. Then he grabbed lube and a few condoms and tucked them into his back pocket. With a satisfied grin and a wink at his reflection in the mirror, he collected the glasses, wine bottle, and corkscrew in the kitchen and made his way back into the living room.

Where he found Marcus slowly creeping out of the front door.

“Yer _leavin’_?” Eggsy asked incredulously.

Marcus whipped around with an incredibly fearful look on his face which he tried to mask with awkward guilt. “Uhh, yeah, see I…” he started to explain. His hands were all over the place with pointing to the door and twisting together and trying to reach out to Eggsy for a hug or a handshake or both. It was painfully awkward to watch, but Eggsy was a little alarmed at his sudden retreat. “It’s… I, uh…” He suddenly clapped his hands together and admitted, “It’s my girlfriend.” Eggsy’s eyes narrowed dangerously, both in anger and disbelief. “She, uh… wants to get back together and, uh, you're incredibly hot, Eggsy, but she and I, we go _way_ back, and--”

Eggsy decided to put him out of his misery and growled, “ _Get out_.”

Marcus looked shamefaced. “I’m _really_ sorry,” he apologized and then scarpered like the devil was on his heels. 

Eggsy glared at the door for a long moment after he disappeared then sighed raggedly and slammed the door shut in frustration. 

He glared down at his hard-on and told it, “Jus’ you and me tonight, boy,” before he threw himself down on the couch and poured himself two glasses of wine. Then he rung Roxy.

“How was _Marcus_?” she asked immediately, her tone mocking and annoyed, most likely because Eggsy had turned down a proper British gentleman for an uncouth _Yank_. He could hear gunfire in the background, but she didn’t seem too concerned. He didn’t need to ask how she knew who he was meeting; privacy and secrecy were _luxuries_ in a spy organization. 

Eggsy released another ragged sigh and answered, “I don’t even know wot _’appened_! One minute ‘e was rubbing his frankly _magnificent_ cock up against me and the next 'e was trying to escape like 'e jus’ found out I had an STD or summink!” He ignored the choked breath from the other end of the line. He wasn’t sure if it was Roxy or Ban, but either way, they’d already heard worse just from their earlier conversation. “'E told me 'is girlfriend wanted ta get back together wiv him, but I don’t know if I believed him. 'E had _potential_ , Rox!” Eggsy wailed. “I was going ta ride ‘im like a fuckn’ pony till I couldn’t sit down the next day!”

“Well, given that we have a Round Table meeting scheduled for tomorrow, I would think this is a rather fortunate turn of events, wouldn’t you, Galahad?” suddenly came Arthur’s diplomatic tone over the comms.

Eggsy shot up in his seat and cringed. 

_Ah, fuck_. 

“I’m sorry, sir,” he quickly said in his most apologetic tone while secretly planning to _end_ Roxy for goading him into saying all that in front of Arthur. It wasn’t that Arthur was a stuck up snob who had it out for Eggsy like Chester had been, only that he was unfailingly strict about propriety at work.

“Quite. Now if you’ll kindly clear out the comms, Lancelot will be back to hear about your... troubles just before our meeting tomorrow.”

“Yes, sir,” Eggsy answered promptly and, without further word, logged out.

Then he quickly downed both glasses of wine one after the other.


	3. Suspicions Arise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Michelle's not being as cooperative as Eggsy need's her to be, but on the bright side, he's got a date! Which... kind of doesn't end as well as he was hoping, but hey. It counts.

“Aww, I’m sorry, flowah, but big bruv’s gotta go work,” Eggsy cooed with an apologetic kiss to the cheek when Daisy scrunched up her face and whimpered. It was six in the morning, i.e. _not_ a proper time for a growing three-year-old to be shaken awake, but he had a briefing at nine and if he wanted to avoid being tagged with the infamous Galahad reputation--which he had been managing spectacularly for the last year--he needed to get her up, dressed, and out the door by seven.

He’d agreed to watch her last night while his mum had a girls’ night out with some of her friends back from the estate. They were nice ladies who had been there for them when Dean grew unbearable, so Eggsy was all too happy to give his mum time with them, but now it was time for Daisy to go.

“Sleepy,” Daisy complained, burying her face in Eggsy’s neck while he carried her to the bathroom.

“I know, Dais, but a nice warm bath will wake you right up, yeah? There’s lotsa bubbles. You like bubbles, dontcha?” He set her down on the bath mat, keeping her steady while he undressed her.

“M-hmm,” she agreed sleepily and then wriggled around to see the promised mound of bubbles Eggsy had made sure to prepare, her eyes widening in delight. He helped her into the tub and started washing her like he had done hundreds of times before. As expected, the sleep faded away quickly at the first handful of water dumped on her head, and she was soon squealing as she chased the bubbles around the tub and splashed water all over Eggsy’s clothes. He was glad he had the foresight to wear jeans and a white shirt and not one of his suits, but only because of the convenience of it--Daisy had blanket permission to ruin any suit of his with her utter adorableness.

Well, all except for one suit which was carefully tucked away in the back of his closet, protected with a plastic covering and only brought out when Eggsy was feeling particularly sentimental. Once had been the day before V-day, and the other on his mentor’s birthday.

One year, two months and three days to the date when Harry passed away, and still, Eggsy felt like a limb was missing.

It wasn’t as if he had any right to feel like his heart had been ripped out because he’d known Harry a grand total of eleven months--seven of those Harry spent in a _coma_ for fuck’s sake--but those four other months? 

Well, they were special weren’t they?

A lifetime of insults and scoldings from Dean and his dogs, and with a bit of positive attention and a few words of praise, Harry had managed to turn himself into the center of Eggsy’s world, and Eggsy would have done _anything_ to make him proud and garner his attentions. It wasn’t even a sexual thing--though Eggsy couldn’t deny the _appeal_ of that--and even now, he still felt the need to impress Harry with his thoughts and actions.

Merlin would probably order him to therapy if he knew, but Eggsy wasn’t _malfunctioning_ , so he didn’t need it. He just missed Harry is all.

“Hold still, luv!” he laughed as Daisy wriggled out of his reach while he tried to rinse her off. It took him three tries to grab her and wrestle her into a towel and then fifteen minutes more to dress her up and ready her to head out. “Yer worse than JB, you are!” he told her while he struggled to get her coat on her. The pug almost seemed smug as he sat by the door, already in his harness and leash. He stayed with Michelle and Daisy when Eggsy was going to be called out on a mission, so he, too, was going to be dropped off today.

“Ready?” he asked the both of them as he shrugged on his jacket.

“Train, train, train!” Daisy chanted in excitement. She _loved_ the tube, probably coz she got to ride it so rarely now that they lived in a good neighborhood, so Eggsy made sure to take her on it whenever he could even though he could properly afford a cab now. Besides, London traffic was _mental_ at this time, so the tube was, in fact, the better option.

“Yeah, yeah,” Eggsy laughed, and they made their way to the station, Daisy’s hand in one hand and JB’s lead in the other. He juggled them around a bit to pick up breakfast for all of them, including Michelle, at a nearby McDonald’s because Eggsy was craving for a coffee and a breakfast sandwich, then struggled through the rush hour crowd to get to their platform.

In hindsight, it would have probably been a better idea to grab breakfast after they’d gotten _off_ the train than before they got on it because in their hurry to catch the 7:20, Eggsy found himself _slamming_ into someone and promptly decorating the two of them with coffee and juice.

“Bollocks!” Eggsy yelled in surprise as his paper bag exploded. It thankfully took the bulk of the liquids, but a great deal of spattering made itself known on his and the other guy’s clothes. “Shit. Fuck, I’m _so_ sorry,” he started to tell him and then remembered he was holding onto the hand of a toddler and winced. He told Daisy, “Oh, no. No, don’t say those words, darlin.’ Mum might _kill_ me.” She merely looked confused, so Eggsy blew out a breath of relief and turned once more to the other guy.

And _Jesus_ was he a damn good sight to see: salt and pepper hair, distinguished lines on his face, a mighty fine suit (not bespoke, but passable), and laughing blue eyes.

“I am _so_ sorry,” he repeated without the profanity and in a nicer accent that wasn’t quite upper crust, but wasn’t South London either. He pulled out a few paper napkins from the bag with the sandwiches and dabbed at the mess on the guy’s suit while the man pulled out his own handkerchief and dabbed at himself at the same time.

“Not to worry,” he said in a distracted, refined voice. “It’s not a huge mess. I’ll be fine, thank you. Thank you.” He waved Eggsy’s hands away and gestured to his white shirt which was now speckled orange and brown. “I think you came out worse than I did, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have run into you, but--” They found each other’s eyes, and Eggsy felt his heart flutter in his chest. “--I admit, you had me a little distracted.”

Eggsy dabbed at himself absently, and answered, “I’m headed to me mum’s before work. I can change there, so it’s no problem. Sorry about your, er, suit. I, uhh.” He fumbled with his wallet and pulled out a calling card that said in simple elegant font:

_‘Gary “Eggsy” Unwin_  
Senior Tailor  
Kingsman, Saville Row’ 

“Let me get it cleaned for you, if you’d like. You can just pop by ‘round the shop and look fer me. Or show them this if I ain’t around.” The guy’s eyebrows lifted.

“Kingsman Tailors, huh?” He seemed impressed, so it wasn’t a stretch to say he’d heard about the shop. “Aren’t you a little young to be a senior tailor… Gary?” he asked.

“It’s, uh…” He gestured to the card. “... ‘Eggsy.’ And yeah, I am. But I learn fast.” He shrugged and gave the man a dimpled grin. 

He was very aware that he was _flirting_ , he was, but who the fuck cared?

The man pulled out his own business card and held it out. It said, ‘Crawford & Cunningham, Barristers and Solicitors, Pierce Crawford, Senior Barrister’ and at the back, his business address and contact information.

“Mr. Crawford of _Crawford_ and Cunningham,” Eggsy greeted with a small, impressed nod.

“‘Pierce,’ please. And it's a small firm; don’t be too impressed,” Pierce said with a small laugh that seemed to highlight all of the gorgeous lines on his face.

“Eggsy!” Daisy suddenly cut in, shaking his hand to get his attention. Only then did Eggsy remember his leaking bag of drinks and his charges.

“Oh, fu--” He stopped and quickly tacked on, “...uuudge cakes.” Pierce laughed. “Sorry, I gotta get these two to me mum’s or else I’m gonna be late for work.” Eggsy did truly regret having to go, so he added hopefully while he walked backwards away from the man, “But hey, I mean. Come by the shop some time, let me sort that out for you.”

“I might do that,” Pierce agreed with a nod and a smile, and then, with a final wave, he was swallowed up by the crowd.

Eggsy, feeling a bit giddy, dumped the leaking back in the nearest trash can and _ran_ to catch the 7:30 train. He picked up more coffee on the way and made it to his mum’s at five past eight.

“Mum!” he called into the house while he put everything down on the hall table so that he could help JB out of his harness and Daisy out of her jacket before he shed his own. Already, the two scampered off to play in the living room as they usually did. He stowed away the jacket and harness and moved the breakfast bags to the dining table before he jogged upstairs, two at a time, to look for him mum in her room.

He found her there, as expected, but _how_ he found her was another matter.

The sight of her, strewn across the bed still in her clothes from the night before, make up smeared and hand clutching an empty vodka bottle brought back _memories_. Terrible memories that made Eggsy’s blood boil and muscles tremble in remembered fear.

“Mum!” he called out to her once more, pushing her head back to inspect her face. She cracked open an eye, glassy and exhausted that declared her hangover and a little bit more. Relieved but also annoyed, Eggsy blew out a breath and fell back on the floor. “Wot the fuck is this, mum?” he demanded angrily. “I thought you wos goin’ out wiv friends, not getting _high_!”

Michelle grunted and pushed herself up into a sitting position. She rested her forehead in her palm and groaned before she could respond. “Ugh, babe, I’m not feelin’ well at all. Can't this wait?”

“No!” Eggsy answered, incredulous and pissed. “It _can’t_ wait because I'm flyin’ out ov England today. How can I leave Daisy with you when yer drunk and _high_?! Jesus, mum! I thought you were over this when we left Dean!”

“It wasn’t--it wasn’t--we were jus’ ‘avin’ a bit of fun, me an’ the girls. I am--am over it,” was Michelle’s halting reply. “I’m sorry, babe. You should--you should go catch yer flight.”

“What I should do is take Daisy to Jamal’s until you can fuckin’ sort yerself out!”

“No,” Michelle to protested, pushing herself to her feet and wavering until Eggsy jumped up and steadied her. “I’m fine, Eggsy. Jus’ need a shower, and I’ll be right as rain. I done this load a’ times before. Jus’ gimme a sec.”

Eggsy wanted to argue some more because just because she had the experience didn’t mean she _should_ be doing it again, but _fuck it_ he didn’t have the time to deal with this and he didn’t _want_ to. So he helped her into the bathroom and went back into her room to pick up. He collected the empty vodka bottle and checked her things for the drugs she could have gotten high off of. Nothing, so he went through the rooms and started looking for caches. Still nothing, so a little mollified, he went to feed Daisy. It might have just been a one-off, though it didn’t _excuse_ Michelle. He was going to have to talk to her when she was proper sober.

When Michelle came down, she looked very much better, though the pinch between her eyebrows still boasted a headache. Well, that was her problem, wasn't it? But as long as she could take care of Daisy, Eggsy could leave.

“You okay?” he asked, not quite ready for a long discussion just yet because at this point, he had to book it to make his nine o'clock briefing.

Michelle slumped into the chair opposite Daisy and sighed. “Yeah. ‘M sorry, babe,” she answered. “Dunno wot came over me last night and made me decide to try it again. It wasn’t that I wos _lookin’_ fer it or anythin.’”

“Yeah, well,” Eggsy cut her off sternly, not quite willing to listen to her excuses. He passed her Daisy’s plate “I gotta go. Behave, _please_ , least until I get back, all right?” 

“Yeah, all right. I’ll see you soon, babes,” she smiled tiredly. 

Eggsy gave her and Daisy kisses on the tops of their heads and said, “See you Monday,” before rushing to the shop.

…………… 

“Mr. Unwin, before you go,” Dagonet called as he was heading home. Eggsy, worn out physically and mentally from his recent mission, turned to face him, _praying_ it wasn’t anything pressing. He didn’t think he could stand another meeting just after he’d gotten off an eight-hour flight after an intense, three-day mission and a two-hour debriefing right after that. He’d _crawl_ right now if he could, and the only thing on his mind was a long, hot bath and at least twelve hours of sleep. Thankfully, he only found Dagonet to be holding up a white box with a gold ribbon. 

“Wot’s this?” he asked, taking it from the old man and digging right in.

“A Barrister Crawford left it for you the day after you flew out,” Dagonet answered pleasantly. Eggsy’s eyebrows lifted in surprise, and then he pulled out a plain white v-necked shirt from beneath the folds of gold tissue paper. The same white v-necked shirt he was wearing the day they met. A surprised laugh escaped him before he found the card that came with it.

_‘Dearest Eggsy. While I am sure a senior tailor such as yourself would know quite well how to handle stains in a cotton shirt, I would nevertheless like to replace the shirt I ruined. And maybe hope to see you wearing this over coffee? Yours, Pierce.’_

A stupid, enamoured grin stole over Eggsy’s face, mirrored with an amused one over Dagonet’s.

“It's just from a friend,” Eggsy, for some unfathomable reason, tried to explain. The old man only turned to his log sheets to feign nonchalance.

“Well, Mr. Unwin, I should advise you that this… _friend_ looked rather disappointed when he found you to be out of the country. And that he asked me to remind you that you knew where to contact him?”

“Oh!” Eggsy remembered and pulled out his wallet where Pierce’s card was tucked in one of the pockets. He shuffled it to the hand that held the shirt so that he could pull out his phone and dial the number on the back of the card. It rung twice before there was an abrupt ‘ _Crawford_.’

“Uh, hi? Pierce? It’s Eggsy. We, uh, met in the tube?”

“ _Oh! Oh, Eggsy! Yes, yes of course!_ ” was the pleasantly surprised response. “ _How are you?_ ”

“Well, I just got back from Abu Dhabi not three hours ago, so y’know, sorry about disappearing on you so soon,” he explained, and then added, suddenly shy, “I, uh, got your gift. You didn’t have to, y’know.”

“ _I know I didn’t, but I wanted to_ ,” Pierce answered. “ _To be honest, I was debating between that and flowers, but I thought flowers might be too over the top_.”

“Glad you decided to go with this. I wouldn’t have been able to appreciate the flowers before they wilted,” Eggsy said.

“ _Hmm_ ,” Pierce hummed thoughtfully. “ _That doesn’t make it sound like flowers are off of the table._ ”

“It--Uh...” Eggsy was fucking _blushing_ , and it was ridiculous. Embarrassing by the way Dagonet was trying to suppress his smile. “You free for coffee?” he decided to ask because he wasn’t a _teenage girl_ and didn’t need to wait for a guy to ask him out.

“ _I was free for coffee three days ago. Unfortunately, now not as much._ ”

“Oh.”

“ _I am free for dinner though._ ”

"All right," Eggsy agreed. The smile on his face felt just a tad mushy, so he turned to browse the neckties to hide it from Dagonet. "Is eight okay? Jus' got off a flight, need a bit of a kip before I'm remotely functional again."

He could very well imagine that he could hear the smile in Pierce's when he agreed, " _Eight is perfect_."

So at promptly seven thirty, Eggsy walked out of his flat in a fitted brown trousers, a white button down, and a navy blazer.

Though he was still feeling somewhat washed out, he nonetheless felt enthusiastic to meet up with Pierce--and not even for the promise of riding his cock either. He was hopeful that this could be _it_ in a way he hadn't been since... Well, _since_.

When Eggsy arrived at the station where they ran into each other where they agreed to meet, Pierce had yet to do so, so the boy settled himself against a wall and waited while Londoners hurried around in front of him even at the late hour: businessmen hurrying home after work, businessmen hurrying _to_ work, friends headed to the clubs, lovers to dinner, men and women who had somewhere to be. Like all major cities, after all, London wasn’t quite ready yet to go to sleep. 

This was promising, Eggsy decided to himself. He could feel the beginnings of something good with Pierce in a way he hadn’t with Grayson. He felt _eager_ and rather hoped he’d end up in Pierce’s bed at some point during the evening--but more than that, he found that if he didn’t, he wouldn’t quite mind as long as it led to another date.

He checked his phone for Pierce’s whereabouts just as another faceless businessman crossed his path. 

Suddenly, his olfactory senses with inundated with the intoxicating and shockingly _familiar_ scent of Balmain’s Carbone. He would recognize it _anywhere_ because he spent at least four months catching whiffs of it here and there, twenty four hours being surrounded by the scent completely, three weeks after V-Day wallowing in a robe that smelled _exactly_ like it, and about three more months after that smelling like it himself when he nicked the half-empty bottle off of Harry’s dresser (and if Merlin judged him for it, he never said anything out loud anyway). He even kept the empty bottle that still smelled strongly of the scent long after he’d emptied what Harry had left over.

His head snapped up so fast, he cricked his neck, but the owner of the scent had already been swallowed up by the crowd.

For a moment, for one single moment, Eggsy's _hoped_.

And in the next, he berated his frantically beating heart for being completely and utterly ridiculous. For one, it wasn't a terribly uncommon brand, so to expect no one else to favour the same scent in the entirety of London was ludicrous. For another, Harry was _dead_ , wasn't he?

It had taken Eggsy to the last bit of Harry's scent clinging to his clothes to accept that; he wasn't going to undo all that because of a fucking _whiff_.

He growled low and shoved a hand through his hair to shake the vestiges of unwarranted hope off of himself. Harry was fucking dead and he was _over it_.

"Eggsy!" came an eager voice, and then when it neared, a more concerned, "Are you all right?"

Eggsy looked up to find Pierce looking at him with the same concern on his face as in his voice which just wasn't _on_ because he looked exceptionally dashing in a nice black suit, sans tie, so Eggsy favoured him with a huge, bright smile. "It's nothing. So where are we headed off to?"

Pierce looked concerned for a moment longer before his expression smoothed out into a careful smile. "I thought we might head to this little Greek place nearby. They have the _best_ lamb Youvetsi in London, I promise you. Everyone I bring there loves it. What do you think? Do you like Greek?"

Eggsy did, in fact, which he conveyed with an eager smile and nod. He'd fallen in love with it on the coast of Santorini where he'd spent a weekend lounging practically naked on the hull of a mark's yacht. But he didn't tell Pierce that.

"Sounds fantastic," he agreed, so Pierce held out an elbow which he took with a chuckle. "Thank you. You're ever such a kindly gentleman," he teasingly simpered.

Pierce chuckled and then whispered conspiratorially, "Only with the pretty ones." And then proceeded to make Eggsy blush all throughout dinner.

If two hours later found him pressed up against the outside of Pierce's door with said man's mouth on his while he fumbled with his keys, no one was around to judge him anyway.

After the third time he jiggled the doorknob to no avail, Eggsy laughed and pushed him back.

"Maybe we should stop before we actually start goin' at it in the hallway," he teased.

"Not an altogether unpleasant idea," Pierce answered with a grin just as the lock clicked open. His eyebrows lifted in jest. "But fortunately we seem to have _unlocked_ more options."

Eggsy feigned a groan as he followed Pierce in. "That was fuckin' awful, and you should be ashamed of yourself."

"Ah, but if it gets you inside my flat, then I can't possibly be," Pierce kissed him once more, just a brief peck on the lips--or it was supposed to be anyway until Eggsy held him there against his mouth, and when they once more pulled apart, the older man's smile was just a little bit softer around the edges and dazed. Eggsy mentally patted himself on the back for it. "Shall I get you a drink? I did promise one," Pierce murmured still standing thrillingly close.

A little bit of liquid courage could never go amiss, so Eggsy murmured a dreamy, "Yeah."

Pierce gestured him to the sofa and offered, "Please, have a sit," before he wandered in the direction of what Eggsy noted was mini bar. “A Glendronach okay?” he called out.

Eggsy gave him a knowing grin and answered with a teasing roll of his eyes, “‘Okay,’ he says. Of _course_ a Glendronach would be okay.” Pierce grinned back and fixed up a pair of glasses, leaving Eggsy to inspect the rest of the flat with it's high ceilings, fantastic open-plan kitchen and living areas, lofted bedroom, and huge windows. He gave out a low whistle and said, "I thought you said it was a small firm. This ain't possibly from the earnings of a small firm, mate."

"It is, my dear, but before that, I was with McCullogh and Hunter and represented Mr. Walter Cunningham the third who gave me this as a thanks for settling his divorce case. Said he'd rather I have it than his ex-wife."

Eggsy’s attention snapped back to Pierce. "Cunningham?" he asked. “ _The_ Walter Cunningham?” Pierce gave him a smile as he brought the whiskies over.

"Walter Cunningham the third, the biggest steel supplier in Northern Europe, yes," he agreed. "Who also happens to be my business partner, hence ‘Crawford and Cunningham.’ He urged me to open my own firm after his debacle with his wife and volunteered to invest in it. His company is our only client right now, but we earn more than enough to sustain our operations just from retainer fees alone."

"Wow. Impressive," Eggsy answered. "Can't imagine it's an easy thing."

Pierce shrugged. "What business is?" And then he snagged Eggsy by the waist. "But let's not talk about work, shall we? I daresay there are better topics of conversation to be had." He dipped his head to brush his lips against Eggsy's. "Like exactly how is it that you would like me to take you."

Eggsy's eyelids fell halfway shut of their own accord. He tilted his head back to look up at Pierce and answer, "Maybe you could show me that bed o’ yours, then I can decide."

Pierce chuckled. "That I believe I can do."

They shared another kiss while the man herded him up the stairs with an ease of familiarity of the space that Eggsy, too, shared despite it being the first time he even stepped foot in here. It wouldn’t do, after all, for a spy to bumble about an unfamiliar location, so he’d learned early on to sharpen his senses, take stock of his environment, and memorize and adapt to it. Nevertheless, Eggsy faked a stumble just so he didn’t seem _too_ familiar and earned himself an affectionate chuckle for it.

“Careful,” Pierce said before diving back to smother the sheepish smile on his mouth.

At the top of the steps, Eggsy found himself pinned up between the wall and Pierce who was eagerly nailing him to it with frantic thrusts of the hip. He moaned in delight and met the man thrust for thrust, eager for it and encouraging because he was determined to end the night with a spectacular orgasm for the both of them.

Only suddenly, he was once again haunted by the scent of Harry’s scent.

It was faint, so faint that Eggsy wasn’t entirely sure it wasn’t just a memory, but it didn’t seem to matter whether or not it was _real_ because quickly, his arousal was dampened and Pierce’s mouth felt unwelcome on his.

Frustrated with himself, he tried to ignore it and prolong the kiss, but it became quickly clear that both actions were futile while the scent--or the memory of it--lingered, so he pressed one hand to the other man’s chest and pushed him back only the slightest amount to indicate that they should stop. Pierce did.

“Is something the matter, Eggsy?” he asked, genuine worry in his tone that made Eggsy feel incredibly guilty for his abrupt one-eighty.

“I’m sorry,” Eggsy sighed. He tightened his grip when Pierce started to pull back because he didn’t want to put the man off completely, just let him know that tonight probably wasn't the best time for anything more. “It’s just… Well, just an unwelcome memory is all.”

Pierce seemed to chew over his thoughts for a long time, and Eggsy knew how his words sounded, but how was he supposed to explain that he could smell the man he’d once thought of as a mentor--maybe more than that--who was supposed to be dead? 

In the end, the barrister thankfully only asked, “Are you okay? Can I do anything to help?” Eggsy shook his head and then shrugged.

“It’s not a big deal, I promise. I ain’t getting like… Cold feet or anything, but maybe I get a raincheck?” It was as frustrating for him as it was for Pierce, but, well, if it was as promising as Eggsy had felt it to be, they had no reason to rush, did they? Pierce smiled gently and then nodded. Then he sighed and pressed a kiss to Eggsy’s cheek.

“Why don’t I put the kettle on for us?” he suggested. Eggsy nodded once more.

“Do you have a loo up here?” he asked, gesturing into the bedroom.

“Yes, yes, please go ahead,” Pierce waved him inside and then made his way back downstairs and to the kitchen. Eggsy waited until he was occupied with preparing tea before he headed upstairs to investigate the scent. It was there, still faint, but _there_ , not simply a phantom, and Eggsy needed to know _why_. If it turned out Pierce used the perfume, it could be a sign that Eggsy was heading in the right direction with him. 

If not. Well. 

Eggsy wasn’t quite sure what that meant, to be honest.

The scent was strongest in the bathroom, the enclosed room preventing dispersal unlike in the rest of the flat, so Eggsy started looking through Pierce’s drawers and medicine cabinet, unconcerned with snooping because if he was, he’d certainly chosen the wrong line of work to be in.

He found nothing even _remotely_ resembling Carbone and blew out a frustrated breath.

He tapped his glasses on and scanned the vanity for fingerprints because if someone else had been here, surely he’d be able to find something. He found, however, only his and Pierce’s, which was concerning as it was baffling, but short of asking whichever tech was present at the mansion right now to do a check on security cameras, there wasn’t much else he could do right now. Knowing his luck, he’d probably get Merlin himself on the line then how was he going to explain away his fixation on Harry and his perfume.

No, right now, the best thing would be to go back down, drink his tea, and then turn in for the night.

He’ll have Elaine look into it tomorrow.


	4. Ghosts of the Past

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eggsy is captured in a mission gone wrong and a ghost appears to save him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Warnings for both implied and graphic torture, gore, and explicit rape!!!**
> 
>  
> 
> This is a dark fic, so yeah. Here comes the darkness.

What Eggsy didn't understand was that is was _Roxy_ who brought a date, and yet it was _he_ that was getting grilled like Ryan and Jamal were being paid to do so. Which, come to think of it, Eggsy wouldn't put past Roxy.

He told them so. “Roxy's date is, like, literally _right there_. Why don’t you fuckin’ interrogate ‘im?!” It didn’t help that the date in question looked just as amused as all three of them did. Ryan and Jamal exchanged knowing glances. “Wot?!” Eggsy demanded defensively.

“Roxy ain’t the one wiv commitment issues, mate,” Jamal pointed out. “So when you tell us yer datin’ some guy and you think you might ‘ave a _good thing goin’_ , we’re gonna ask questions, bruv.” Eggsy gawped at him because he did not fucking have _commitment issues_ , thank you very much. 

He just hasn't found the right one yet.

“Jamal’s right. So how long has that been going on, and why haven’t you told me all about it yet?” Roxy demanded.

Eggsy scrunched his nose at her. “Couple’a dates, and because yer fuckin’ _nosy_ is why. Surprised you ‘adn’t ‘eard about it from Dagonet, really.” Her eyebrow rose elegantly.

“Dagonet knows but your best friend in the whole world--” She glanced at Ryan and Jamal and amended, “--your three best friends in the whole world don’t?”

“It's because you fuckin’ do _this_!” Eggsy whined, gesturing wildly between them. “Christ! Buncha gossipy old biddies, you are. Yer worse than mum!”

Roxy waved her hand as though his words were merely a bothersome fly. “That’s because you don’t tell your mother that you like to ride cock on a regular basis.” Ryan and Jamal snickered and her date choked on his drink, but she only patted his back absently. “At this point, I think she’s still waiting for you to find Miss Right to give her grandchildren.”

“I’ll tell ‘er when I find the right guy for ‘er t’ meet. No point in dashin’ ‘er ‘opes fer nothin,’ is there?”

Roxy rolled her eyes, but she was smiling anyway as she said (ordered, really), “So tell us about him. What does he do? What does he look like?”

Eggsy traced the rim of his glass absently.

"Well… 'e's a barrister, corporate mostly, but he's also handled divorce cases. 'E owns a firm ov 'is own, just a few employees, nothing big. Crawford & Cunningham--the 'Cunningham' bein' Walter Cunningham the third." Roxy's eyebrow lifted, but she said nothing... Yet. "'E's well-versed at what 'e does, 'e says; 'e's won 'isself a right few cases, includin' Cunningham's divorce, which was the reason they went inta business together. 'E's..." Eggsy thought briefly about how to describe him. "...tall, got impeccable style, sorta blackish hair, and _fantastic_ blue eyes."

Ryan barked out a laugh. "'Blackish' hair? Wot the fuck kinda description is that?"

Eggsy scowled at him before admitting that, "Well, it's sort ov a salt-and-pepper thing. Very distinguished. Like George Clooney."

"Salt-and-pepper?" Jamal asked, his eyebrow raised. "Exactly 'ow old is this bloke ov yers, bruv?" And Eggsy realized where he slipped up. It’s not that he didn't expect to hold off on introducing him to Roxy forever, or God forbid was _hiding_ him, just that he didn’t want Roxy to misunderstand. 

He glared at Jamal and made a subtle abortive gesture that Roxy wouldn't see. Jamal didn't seem to understand, however and continued, "Because 'e's startin' to sound like that geezer you'd been moonin' over after V-Day." Roxy's eyebrows flew up.

"What geezer?" she asked and _fuck_. Eggsy was fucking _fucked_. He avoided her gaze and chugged down his beer, but it was a stretch to assume she'd drop it. "What geezer?" she repeated when she caught his eye.

"That dead guy ‘oo gave 'im that blue suit with the chopped up tie? Looks like an older Colin Firth?" Ryan offered helpfully. Eggsy kicked his shin, just a light tap which, admittedly, from an international super spy, was the equivalent of a full-force kick from a bratty child. "Ow! Wot the fuck!"

"Harry?" she asked, her eyes growing wide in Ryan's direction.

"No!" Eggsy denied just as Jamal exclaimed, "That's 'im!" So he kicked Jamal as well.

" _Eggsy_ ," Roxy said.

“I ‘aven’t been _moonin’_ over ‘im!” Eggsy protested as Roxy’s disposition soured. “ _I ‘aven’t_!”

“Bruv, I can’t believe you never told ‘er,” Jamal pointed out.

Roxy’s glare was absolutely _poisonous_. “Neither can I,” she said, coolly and quietly.

“Coz there’s nothin’ _to_ tell!” Eggsy exclaimed, throwing his hands up in exasperation. “All right, so I _miss_ Harry, but ‘e was the one ‘oo got me out of my shit life! ‘E was the one ‘oo gave me the chance t’ make somethin’ ov myself! Is it that farfetched to think I would miss ‘im without bein’ fuckin arse over _tits_ fer ‘im? Fuck!”

And even though he was practically lying in his friends’ faces, he failed to feel guilty when Roxy touched his arm and said sincerely, “You’re right, Eggsy. I’m sorry.”

Jamal and Ryan looked equally abashed and Roxy’s date just looked uncomfortable, so Eggsy, not looking to milk a lie, calmed his disposition and nodded at the three of them. Then he turned to Roxy’s date and said, “So, mate, wot are yer intentions wiv me girl ‘ere?”

…………… 

Eggsy woke for the umpteenth time that evening, groggy, in pain, and knowing he was in a _fuckton_ of trouble while he tried to shake off whatever drugs they had given him to keep him sedated and practically useless, and his first thought was, 'No one in HQ better be getting their rocks off on this.' Which was meant to be humorous, really, because he knew the exact opposite was true. 

Everyone in Kingsman would be in a flurry of panicked activity to extract him from this mission gone wrong. Merlin would have to pull out a knight from their mission, because this was one of those rare instances where all twelve of them were out in the field, and probably bring in the minor agents who were primarily used for mansion security, but when the need arose, also functioned as a fairly large extraction team.

He felt a bit shit for having to be bailed out of a mission. Granted, it was only for the first time ever in his career and that all of the more experienced agents had several failed missions under their belt, but then Roxy had never needed to be extracted from any of her missions so far, so Eggsy was feeling a bit competitive.

But then the rhythmic shooting pain in his arse and the burning one... well, all over, really, reminded him that no. He'd rather take the embarrassment of a failed mission over _this_ any day.

Elaine had miscalculated. No ifs and buts about it, but Eggsy wasn't mad at her, not when he knew she was going to beat herself up over it for the rest of her life. He could imagine her tearstained face and thinned mouth as she determinedly followed Merlin's orders to the letter, her hands flying over her keyboard just as three other tech staff would be doing the same. When he got back, Eggsy would have to sit with her and reassure her that he was all right and that she should learn from it and move on. Maybe talk to one of the resident therapists. 

Merlin might have Eggsy do so too, but at this point, God knows he'd agree to _anything_ so long as they'd bail him out.

Elaine had miscalculated and now he was hung by his wrists in a dank cellar, naked as a fucking jaybird, and his legs chained to the floor so wide apart that he had no leverage to keep his weight off his wrists. He was grasping as firmly as he could to the chains above him to keep the manacles from cutting into his wrists, but it had been hours now and he was _shattered_ , so he couldn’t quite keep it up. Rivulets of blood ran down his forearms and his wrists ached like a _bitch_ , but really, those were the least of his concern. 

More important were his missing fingernails, the slices of a whip across his back that had been further enhanced with fucking _salt_ , possibly a broken rib or two, but most of all a goddamned _fucking machine_ splitting him open over and over and over again because Eggsy had been in the middle of breaking up a human trafficking ring in Romania and apparently human traffickers here happened to have random fucking machines lying around.

It had been after several decent rounds of beatings, thirty steel-tipped lashes, salt in them, and the fifth fingernail that his captors realized he wouldn't break from the pain, so they'd quickly moved on to sexual torture by drugging him and throwing him to the mercy of five different men. When that failed to work, they'd strung him up and planted one of their fucking machines beneath him then left him there for the next two hours. It had gone in dry and remained dry, and now Eggsy was torn up and bleeding, nearly numb down there except for when he shifted his grip on the chains.

He wouldn’t break from this. He didn’t know if they knew that, but he was a fucking Kingsman. They could bring him to within an inch of his life, they could cut off both his arms, and still, he wouldn’t talk. But really, Eggsy hoped it wouldn’t come to that. He prayed that HQ acted soon. 

For now all he could do was keep still and think of England which wasn’t a lot different from all the times before Kingsman when he had to brace himself and think of all the baby formula he could buy with the money some faceless John was paying him. Sexual torture was an obvious step up to pain, but Eggsy was probably more immune to the former than the latter.

His grip slipped a little more, and he cried out when the manacles cut more deeply into his wrists and the machine drove further into him.

Four hours. It had been four hours since he had been caught. A quick mental computation told Eggsy that, they should have _been here_ by now.

When the door opened, Eggsy prayed desperately to any deity that would listen, _**Please** be Roxy_.

It wasn’t, of course, because fate liked to constantly spit upon Eggsy.

“How are we doing, little spy?” came the heavily accented taunt of Bogdan Serghei, the leader of this group of thugs. “Are we ready to talk now?” He wasn’t Eggsy’s main target--that one being Iosef Gregore, the actual ringleader of the organization who liked to dress in nice suits and mingle with the upper class like he wasn’t building his fortune on the misfortune of others--but Bogdan was pretty high up in the organization anyway. This one was the one that did the grunt work, kidnapping slaves, breaking them in, ‘training’ them, and selling them off, and he was damn good at it if the way he’d managed to capture Eggsy as soon as he slipped was any indication. Eggsy hadn’t expected to encounter him so soon, but he had standing kill orders for when he had dispatched of his main mark.

And God help him, Eggsy _will_ kill him.

He glared coolly at the man, visualizing with careful detail just how he would blast a neat little hole in the middle of his forehead as soon as he got free. 

Bogdan met his gaze with amusement as he stepped closer. He reached out with one hand, and Eggsy froze, all his pain forgotten, as the Romanian took his cock gently in his hand.

“Such a pretty thing,” he purred. His other hand came up to stroke Eggsy’s bruised cheek. “And such resilience as well. I had thought about killing you, you know? I would have loved to watch the life fade from your pretty green eyes.” Eggsy jerked his head to buck the other man’s hand off when his thumbs stroked over his eyes. Immediately, he regretted the action when his vision flickered and his head swum. Bogdan chuckled and tightened his grip on Eggsy’s cock, making him draw in a sharp breath. 

He murmured, “But I’ve decided to spare you instead and keep you for my own. I think it will be very fulfilling to break you. I will make you learn to love being on your knees and obeying me. You will learn to crave my favor and desire my touch. You will be my greatest accomplishment.” His hand stroked Eggsy, and despite his best intentions, Eggsy felt himself steadily growing hard under the ministrations. Bogdan’s eyes gleamed with accomplishment.

“You’ll be waiting a very long time, then,” Eggsy promised. 

The machine was removed, and he nearly sighed with relief, but he wasn't going to give Bogdan that satisfaction. The other man, with his hand still on him, moved behind him and pressed two fingers of his other hand into Eggsy’s well abused hole. This time, Eggsy couldn’t help the hiss that escaped him. One of Bogdan’s men came up and slid a needle easily into his arm. Eggsy let him because there really wasn’t anything he could do short of bucking wildly and potentially snapping the needle off of the syringe.

The drug swept through him immediately, loosening his muscles and fogging his mind, so much so that he barely noticed when the chains cut further into his wrists and Bogdan slid himself neatly into his hole. He moaned, more out of pain than anything, but the Romanian cooed his approval.

“Yes, lovely thing,” he murmured, sliding his lips up and down the length of Eggsy’s neck and thrusting leisurely into him. His hands gripped Eggsy’s hips, bringing him backwards as he thrust forwards. The heat of his cock was hell in Eggsy’s hole, but the drug kept him pliant and wanting and _hard_.

“Stop,” Eggsy tried, hating how his tongue felt massive in his mouth and slurred his words. He hated himself even more for asking Bogdan to stop.

“I think both of us know that’s not going to happen,” the man murmured. Eggsy could feel him nuzzling the back of his head, and he tried to shy away from it. In response, Bogdan tightened his grip on Eggsy and _snapped_ his hips up sharply.

Eggsy screamed.

His head flew back over Bogdan’s shoulder, and the man caught his chin to hold it there while his hips pistoned violently into the spy, ruthlessly, relentlessly _taking_. His teeth cut into his lip, heedless of the split already marring it, in an effort to silence his whimpers and pleas. 

He was a Kingsman; he won’t break. 

He fucking _won’t_.

“I think he can’t take more, no?” Bogdan told the men with him who readily agreed. His legs were released and lifted up against his sides while fingers traced the stuffed rim.

 _Nonononono_ , Eggsy begged mentally. Outwardly, he only shut his eyes and controlled his breathing. A finger pressed in, dragging a line of fire along the walls of his arse.

 _God, fuck. Merlin! Merlin, where the fuck are you?!_ he pleaded to no one.

Another ‘stop’ was hovering at the end of his tongue, and with each of Bogdan’s thrusts, it was pushed further and further outwards. His lips trembled, his wrists bled, and his arse burned, and Eggsy desperately, desperately held himself back.

And then the door opened, and Eggsy nearly cried with relief when all six men snapped to look in alarm. Clearly none of them were expecting the intrusion, which could mean that this was Eggsy’s salvation.

Bogdan slid out without preamble and left Eggsy hanging in the middle of the room. The spy managed to get his legs beneath him and find relief for his wrists only for the briefest moment because in the next, his legs nearly gave out again because it wasn’t his extraction team that he was staring at. 

In fact, he wasn’t quite sure _what_ he was seeing at all because never before this moment had he believed in the existence of _ghosts_ but there couldn’t be any other possible explanation for the vision that was Harry Hart calmly shutting the door behind himself.

“ _Harry_ ,” was all he managed to say in a voice that was just a little bit afraid of either truths: whether this was really Harry, alive and well after a whole year of mourning, or whether this was merely a hallucination from the cocktail of drugs.

Then Harry was off, shooting forward like a bullet in a barrel. He had two knives in either of his gloved hands and engaged the men one after the other, slicing through tendons and arteries like they were naught but butter. They shot at him, of course; it was almost reflexive at this point, but in the same reflexive behaviour, Harry dodged and weaved through bullets, used the others as a human shield, and when he couldn’t avoid the shots, allowed them to hit his bulletproof suit rather than his exposed skin. 

These men were no match for an agent of Galahad’s calibre--well, the _former_ Galahad, that is, because the current one was presently hung to the ceiling, roughed up and incapacitated. Even without his gun, Harry had them down and out in mere minutes.

By then, Eggsy could _almost_ believe he was real. He watched Harry in silence scan the room around them, checking the five thugs for signs of life. Blood pooled out from all of them, soaking the floor where they lay in deathly stillness. When he was satisfied, he stepped around the dead henchmen and knelt before Bogdan.

He was alive and barely damaged compared to his men that Harry had sliced up into ribbons, just two cuts, one to either wrist, to keep him from using his gun and dazed from a strong blow to the back of his head. Harry picked him up by his hair and dragged him into the chair they’d used to torture Eggsy. Bogdan tried to fight back, but in his current state, he was nothing more than a pesky fly that Harry easily swatted away. He was secured to the chair with the zipties Harry found on the nearby table of torture implements, like Eggsy had been a few hours ago, and it was then that Bogdan--and Eggsy--realized what was happening.

“Who are you?!” Bogdan demanded as he struggled against his bindings, the pain of his wounds and the blood that was now sluggishly flowing from them mostly forgotten in face of the threat of torture. Harry ignored him as he returned to the table and considered the implements spread out on it. His hand ran nearly reverently over the equipment before it came upon a small, sharp knife, lifting it up and inspecting it carefully. It must have passed whatever criteria Harry held because he turned to Bogdan with it held in hand. 

“HELP!!!” the Romanian screamed at the sight of Harry advancing on him. “HELP!!!”

Harry only tutted and straddled him, saying, “The only ones left in this building to help you are exactly those you’ve harmed.” 

And God, but his voice sounded like liquid sin. It washed over Eggsy, filling him up with the warmth of remembrance. He _ached_ for it to be directed at him with those awfully fond words Harry used in speaking to him, but Harry's attention was still focused on Bogdan.

“So, you see, there _is_ no one to help you.” He dragged the blade across Bogdan’s cheek, cutting a fine slice that released just a single line of blood. Then he pressed a thumb into it, and when Bogdan opened his mouth to whimper, Harry slotted the knife between his teeth. The Romanian’s eyes widened as the knife pulled at one corner of his mouth.

“No,” he begged, his accent muffled by the distortion of his mouth, and then Harry flicked his wrist and sliced a curve all the way to his ears.

Bogdan’s piercing scream rang in Eggsy’s ears and echoed about the room, but it was from the spurting blood that he turned away. Bogdan sobbed and begged and bartered with Harry, but the other man said nothing Eggsy could hear in return. There was another scream, and Eggsy knew that if he looked, Bogdan would be sporting himself a Glasgow smile.

He’d never been on the giving end of torture, but he knew that using it as revenge was unjustified. Kingsman only condoned it as a means of information retrieval and only as the very last resort. Harry was out of line, and Eggsy knew it was his duty to stop him, so he called out, “Harry, stop!” from behind his arm, still refusing to bear witness to the gore.

The response he received was another scream and a louder one quickly after that, and Eggsy looked up to see Harry slicing off the second of Bogdan’s eyelids. His eyeballs seemed to bulge out, and they moved frantically to rid themselves of the blood and tears that irritated them. Bogdan was still screaming and sobbing, his hands tugging violently at the bindings about his wrist in an effort to protect his eyes.

Eggsy cringed in sympathetic pain and found the wherewithal to once more demand, “Harry, stop! Stop it! What the fuck do you think yer doin’?!”

“He won’t live to see another day, Eggsy,” Harry promised as he stared into Bogdan’s frantic eyes. They both ignored Bogdan’s pleas for mercy. “But before that, I will make sure he regrets every last bruise he put on you.” There was blood spattered across Harry’s cheek that made the sinister glint in his eyes seem monstrous. His knife sliced a path down his arm, flaying open the skin as it went, and once more, Bogdan’s scream filled the room. 

“Harry, please! Stop this,” Eggsy pleaded. Not for Bogdan because he deserved every second of punishment he received, but for Harry because Harry wasn’t a murderer, Harry wasn’t a _monster_. “ _Please_. Please just take me home. Merlin will sort him out. I want to go home. With you, Harry, I missed you.” Tears prickled at Eggsy’s eyes like they hadn’t in the hours of torture beforehand. “I missed you; I thought you were dead.”

Harry continued to avoid his gaze.

“ _Please_ , Harry,” Eggsy tried once more.

Then Harry shifted backwards and cut open the front of Bogdan’s trousers. Eggsy watched with horror while Harry exposed the man’s member.

“What are you--w-what--” Bogdan stuttered through his sobs. His voice was pitched with fear, and he shied away from Harry who pursed his lips and took hold of his cock with clinical indifference. “What are you doing?! S--stop, please! _Please_ , I’m sorry! What do you want? I’ll do anything. I’ll give you anything!”

“Harry!” Eggsy tried again.

Harry ignored him, telling Bogdan, “It’s far too late for that, Mr. Serghei. You’ve harmed a very important person to me, and I’m not feeling inclined to forgive you for it.”

“I didn’t know! I didn’t know!”

“The sins of your past have caught up with you, I’m afraid,” Harry whispered, looking down his nose at a terrified Bogdan.

And then promptly sliced the knife across the base of his cock.

Eggsy’s head snapped to the side to turn away from the viciously horrific scene as Bogdan’s scream, louder this time, longer, filled the room, masking his own terrified shout. 

Harry. God, _Harry_!

“What the fuck… What the fucking, fucking _fuck_!” he whimpered under his breath, his eyes screwed shut. He couldn’t believe Harry would _do that_ , that Harry would be heartless enough to… to--Jesus _fuck_!

Bogdan sobbed with reckless abandon, writhing where he sat and wailing in terrible agony. He couldn’t even shut his eyes, Eggsy knew, and even after everything that he had done to him, Eggsy pitied and sympathized with him.

“No, no, no, no!!!” he heard Bogdan beg and then he screamed once more, but Eggsy didn’t dare look up, knowing that if he did, his stomach would give up the remnants of this morning’s breakfast that Bogdan had failed to extract. He kept his face hidden behind his bicep still extended over his head, mentally counted to ten in every language that he knew, and conjured up heartwarming memories of Daisy and Roxy and all his other friends.

And then Bogdan stopped.

There was silence for a long while in which Eggsy continued to keep his mind occupied with _anything_ else. Then the sounds of metal clinking, cloth tearing, and Harry walking about the room filled his hearing, and in the next minute, there were hands on his face.

He flinched back, but Harry stepped closer and took his face gently into his hands. “Shhh,” Harry murmured, pressing a warm kiss to his forehead, his cheeks, and everywhere he could reach. “It's over. It's over; he can’t hurt you anymore.” As if that was what concerned Eggsy, as if that was the _problem_ , not the way Harry had violently and ruthlessly _tortured_ another man and _killed_ him in cold blood. “I’ve got you, my boy. I’m here.”

“Who _are_ you?!” Eggsy finally managed to yell. This man smelled like Harry, this man spoke like him, but _God_! Harry would never, _never_ do what he just did.

Harry only lifted his chin and _kissed_ him, and for a split second, Eggsy was _weak_. He’d wanted this for so long, he thought he could never have it, so for a split second, he gave into his pain and his desire and his love for his mentor.

Then he was strong again and bodily shoved Harry away.

“ _Who are you_?” he demanded, more forcefully this time.

“My darling boy,” Harry murmured sweetly, reeling him back in with ease despite the resistance Eggsy put up. He stroked the boy's cheek and kissed it. “My darling, darling boy, I’m so sorry for having left you. But it’s me. It truly is me, I promise you.”

“You’re not Harry,” Eggsy insisted, _sure_ of it. And when he caught sight of Bogdan’s lifeless figure with two knives sticking out of his eyes, he managed to twist out of Harry’s grasp one more time. “You can’t be Harry. You _can’t_ be. He ain’t a fuckin’ _monster_!”

“Eggsy,” Harry said, almost sadly, reaching for him again, but Eggsy danced away as far as the chains would permit him, his fucked up wrists be damned.

“Get away from me!” he exclaimed, dodging the older man.

“ _Eggsy_!” Harry repeated, hurt.

“You ain’t Harry Hart! Don’t fucking _touch me_!” Eggsy yelled, to which Harry scowled and stopped trying to touch him. He watched Eggsy for a long moment, his warm brown eyes turning dark--with annoyance? With hurt? With frustration? Eggsy wasn’t sure. Then he extended his left arm out straight at Eggsy and brought his right hand up to his wrist.

And before Eggsy could protest, Harry hit him with an amnesia dart.


	5. Accusations and Betrayal

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After a million and a half years, I _finally_ manage to update this. Jesus Christ on a bicycle. 
> 
> I fixed up the plot and am looking forward to writing the next few chapters. Here's to hoping there are no gaping plotholes to be found, which was why I got stuck in the first place :S

Merlin had Dr. Walker good and ready for him right at his bedside in Medical the minute of his awakening, but that was to be expected, really. Eggsy would have been more concerned had the good doctor not been there immediately when he woke up.

Well, woke up for the second time, that is. The first time had been mostly a blur of shock, panicked shouting and flailing, flashes of pain, and drugs. Eggsy was sure Bors and Lancelot had been part of the proceedings at certain points, but he couldn't be entirely sure. The second time was a notably calmer event, possibly thanks to the sedative still coursing through his bloodstream.

"Hi, Merlin. Doc," Eggsy managed. His muscles felt fatigued and his mind floaty, but every now and then there were twinges of pain from his wrists, his back, his... well, arse that provided him some measure of focus. And yeah, okay now he remembered the reason why Merlin would feel the resident psychiatrist was necessary. Not that he had anything against Dr. Walker. Even Eggsy--in whose (old) world, shrinks were avoided like the plague and the people that went to see them were called crazy (among other things)--understood that he was very good at what he did, the best Kingsman's extensive budget could afford, and after an initial apprehension, Eggsy had grown to appreciate his help after bad missions.

He supposed this one could be defined as one, a massive understatement though that may be.

"How are you feeling, Eggsy?" Dr. Walker asked in that same neutral tone he always used. Eggsy had once upon a time called it 'gentle' and 'pitying,' and it had grated on him until Dr. Walker helped him realize that that was how he interpreted it because that's how he felt people treated him after V-Day (and Harry's death) and, more importantly, how he felt about himself.

"Is 'like shit' an acceptable emotion?" Eggsy asked with a grin that, yes, may be a little bit forced, but was the best he was able to manage at the moment.

Walker chuckled at the joke, which Eggsy appreciated. "I think in this case, I can accept that," he confirmed. "Now, as much as I'd like to send Merlin away so that we can talk properly, I've been made to understand that he and Arthur are in dire need of information about your mission. He has questions for you, after which you and I can sort through the rest of it." Eggsy nodded and sat up properly. If his entire body screamed in protest, he managed to hide it well, thank you very much, so no one really had to know.

"Yeah, all right. I got the drill," he said when the pain was quickly dulled by the mild painkillers. "Shoot."

Merlin's mouth was awfully thinned and his face pained in an expression Eggsy had seen just once before: when he'd just killed Chester and stormed into HQ to find out what a man whose best friend had just been killed before his very eyes looked like.

The memory of it prompted him to blurt out, "I ain't dead yet."

"For which we are all immeasurably glad," Merlin responded, but it didn't sound like the joke it should have been. Eggsy's mouth turned down, but Merlin had started with his first question. "What's the last thing you remember?"

Eggsy had to think about that one because... Well, because he was drawing a huge blank about what should be a good chunk of time. "What day is it?"

"The 21st. Three in the afternoon," Merlin answered prompt ease. 

The twist of Eggsy's mouth turned into a full blown frown. Three days since he'd shipped out for the mission, and he was missing a good half of it. The last thing he had to go on was… “The machine,” he said out loud, though it was more to himself than to Merlin.

“How long do you remember being on it?” Merlin next asked.

Eggsy tried to recall as best as he could and came up with the answer, “An hour? Maybe a little more?” Merlin hummed a response that seemed disappointed, so Eggsy asked, “How long was it really?”

“We lost the feed just as Serghei’s men came back, but by then, it had been a little under two--”

“Hold up,” Eggsy cut in. “You lost the feed? Again? Guv, you seem to be doing that a lot lately.” To be fair, it had only happened during his last three missions--and _only_ his--but that was three missions too many and too localized to be coincidental.

Merlin scowled in both concern and annoyance. “ _And_ the security tapes as well. When we managed to access them, they were wiped clean of everything that had happened in the building. That’s what makes your lack of memory an even more urgent matter to resolve.” Eggsy blinked. 

“Did you check the security room? Prints? Clues? Anything?”

“Of course,” Merlin said in a near scoff. But there was a hesitance in his voice that had Eggsy prompting him with an “And? What’d you find?”

“ _Your_ prints, Galahad.” 

Eggsy blinked.

“ _Mine_?!”

Merlin explained, “We found you in the security room, trousers on and watch beside you, but the rest of your kit still stashed away in one of their containers, so we surmised that’s where they kept your things. Your prints were everywhere: keyboards, drawer doors, papers, guns--yours and the security staff’s and no one else’s. Not just in the security room, but also in the room where they held you.” Eggsy gaped at him, wracking his brain for a reasonable explanation, but he could find none. Merlin’s face soured as he said, “Arthur has a working theory, but I’m working to counter it.”

“It ain't sumthin' I'm gonna wanna hear, innit?” Eggsy asked.

“You won’t,” the tech wizard confirmed. He told Eggsy anyway, “He suggests that Serghei, for whatever reason, disabled the cameras before he returned to interrogate you, during which time he must have given you some sort of advantage such that you were able to escape and... incapacitate him and his men. When you had done so, you found the security room, wiped everything clean and darted yourself--your watch has one missing dart to further support the theory.”

“Yes, but why would I dart meself? Why would I ‘ide my escape?” Eggsy pointed out. There was something more to the story, of that he was sure, and for it, his heart started to thud in his chest.

Merlin stared at him for a long moment, carefully cataloguing every inch of his expression, evaluating its sincerity, so Eggsy held perfectly still and allowed himself to be subjected to it. And then Merlin tapped on his clipboard. “Because of this,” he said and flipped the clipboard over.

Eggsy stared at the picture for all of five seconds before turning away and heaving rapid breaths to hold the scant contents of his stomach at bay.

“I din’t do that, Merlin,” he croaked, head still facing the other direction as if that could cleanse his mind of the image of Bogdan’s mutilated corpse. A pair of knives shoved in his lidless eyes and his dismembered cock shoved in his Joker-esque mouth. “I din’t do it,” he repeated firmly.

A hand landed on his shoulder. “I know you couldn’t have, lad,” Merlin said softly. “But we need to find out who did, why they did it, and how. It was too clean a job to have been your doing considering you were drugged up to your gills and the evidence against you was too deliberate, but none of our team could find any evidence of a third party and that doesn’t settle well with any of us, which is why Arthur’s latching onto any explanation he can find.”

Eggsy turned to his mentor and friend, determined this time. “I din’t do it, Merlin. I won’ do that to anyone fer any reason. I’ll swear it on me life.”

“I believe you, lad. I truly do.” And Eggsy did believe that he did.

“So wot now?” he asked. His eyes flickered to the clipboard that was thankfully wiped free of the image.

Merlin’s mouth settled into a grim, but determined line. “For now, you’re benched on account of your injuries.” A quick glance at Dr. Walker. “The mental ones too. After you've been cleared by Medical and Psych, we’ll hopefully have an answer. Otherwise.” He shrugged. “It’s up to Arthur.”

……………

He willingly stayed in the clutches of Medical for the full week they demanded even though, like most other agents did, he would have usually checked himself out in half the time they asked for (For that, Eggsy believed they doubled their numbers just to keep agents where they were for the correct amount of time). He didn’t mind this time around, though, because despite being practically bedridden for most of it, Roxy and Merlin and nearly everyone else in the whole damn agency came to see him to play cards or watch movies or gossip or what have you in an attempt to keep him busy and entertained while he healed.

Dr. Walker came in once a day to help him “process the trauma,” as Eggsy had expected him to do, so he didn't mind. It was during his psych sessions that he found it was marginally easier to parse through his own torture than the part where he had, apparently, tortured Serghei to a painful death.

The image Merlin showed him niggled his mind and lingered in his thoughts and even went so far as to invade his dreams. Some dreams showed him with blood on his face and sadistic glee in his eyes as he carved off Serghei’s eyelids. Some dreams showed him doing it from another person’s perspective while he hung from his wrists in the distance. Both kinds left him gasping and sweating when he woke up in the dead of the night.

Elaine came in the day after he’d woken, falling to her knees at his bedside and sobbing out her already puffy, haunted eyes. She begged his forgiveness (that he’d already given way back when he was still in the room) and told him she had officially resigned (which Eggsy immediately protested, only to find that Arthur had already accepted it while also keeping her under watch as the investigation was ongoing). She hugged him tight and accepted his reassurances before leaving a little less distraught than before, for which Eggsy was glad.

Halfway to recovery, Eggsy finally found himself released from Medical, accompanied by Roxy back to his flat and with promises to see Dr. Walker every Tuesday and Saturday.

“I’m fuckin’ _fine_ , Rox,” he told his best mate when she _wouldn’t stop fussing_. “Jesus, and ‘ere I thought me mum was still safely tucked away in Holborn.”

Roxy shoved him with a laugh and then quickly righted him when he staggered. “Shit, sorry, Eggs,” she apologized and, completely negating the apology, shoved him down onto the nearest sofa and told him, “Stay.”

“I ain’t a fuckin’ dog, woman!” Eggsy protested.

Roxy ignored him and said instead, “I’ll fetch us some tea.”

“And I ain’t a fuckin’ invalid neither!” Eggsy yelled at her retreating back.

The tea _was_ nice, though, a dark brew that he’d come to enjoy after Harry had taught him all the nuances of tea preparation, and he appreciated that Roxy was here, tucked against his side, to settle him back into his flat.

“‘Ave they made any progress on the case?” Eggsy asked as casually as he could manage while they were watching Inside Out, trying for an ‘I really don’t care’ vibe that he knew had an ice cube’s chance in hell of fooling Roxy. True enough, her lips twisted into a small frown.

“Merlin’s still going through what we have with a fine-toothed comb,” she admitted, her eyes still trained on the movie. “We don’t really have much to go on, though.”

“‘Ow ‘bout the witnesses? The other people in the brothel?”

Roxy shook her head. “There was no one to question when we came. Both victims and clients had cleared the building, and all the gang members had been either in the room they held you in or in the security room, so they’re all dead. We did manage to track down several victims while you were in Medical, but they couldn’t tell us anything. Just that they realized no one was around anymore and so they simply left. Merlin’s working on identifying which clients are regulars from whatever footage we have on hand and what he can hack from their main servers and identifying which clients had been there that day based on body fluids and other clues so that we can bring them in for questioning.”

She twisted around to look at him properly. “They’ll find something, Eggsy. I’m sure they will; Merlin won’t let anything slip through his fingers, you know him. And while he hasn’t yet found anything, everyone’s on your side; we know you wouldn’t do it. Arthur’s just being an arse.”

“Yeah, I know that,” he said, cuddling into her once more. “I ain’t afraid neither ‘coz I din’t do nuthin’ wrong.” Roxy hummed her agreement, bless her, but every day that there wasn’t anything else to find made Eggsy a little less sure of himself.

What if he _had_? They’d given him a shit ton of drugs, after all. What if one of those had made him snap?

What if he snapped again?

“I wouldn’t do that,” he murmured into his tea, mostly to himself.

Roxy hummed another agreement and then quickly changed the topic, saying, “A Pierce Crawford called on you on Tuesday.” Eggsy was suddenly filled with mixed feelings and a mild degree of alarm because he had been planning to ease Roxy into the idea of Pierce. Although _that_ plan had been mostly shot to hell when Jamal and Ryan opened their big mouths.

“‘E did?” Roxy looked up at him and smiled.

“Dagonet told me. He came to the shop, asking after you. Apparently you were supposed to go out for dinner Monday?”

“Shit, yeah, we was. I probably should ring him, shouldn’t I?”

“Probably should. He seems like a nice guy,” Roxy answered with feigned casualness, so Eggsy narrowed his eyes at her.

“‘Ave you been pokin’ yer nose where it don’t belong, Rox?” he demanded.

Her grin was unrepentant. “I’m a spy, Eggsy,” she pointed out. “Of course I have.” But then her smile softened and she reached up to poke Eggsy’s cheek. “I think he could be good for you,” was her heartfelt observation. And then a more teasing one, “Maybe he can help you get over mooning over Harry.”

“Ugh. I ain’t _moonin’_!” he exclaimed, making the girl laugh brightly.

………...

On Friday, Eggsy deemed himself healed enough that his mum wouldn’t notice so long as he wore a polo with a popped collar and a jacket to hide most of the injuries on him. He still had a split lip and some bruising on his cheek, but he could easily pass that off as martial arts training--his usual excuse.

So early in the morning, he hopped onto the Tube and made his way down to Holborn and up to the flat he’d bought his mum with his first few paychecks, a nice little two bedroom number that would allow room for Daisy to grow.

“Mum?” he called as he unlocked the door and came in. Immediately, he was greeted with the smell of cigarettes and alcohol, a scent he had long since grown used to, but had thought wouldn’t encounter again since they’d left the estates. Alarmed, he rushed to his mum’s room to find her in bed, bottles all around her and an ashtray on the nightstand filled with stubbed-out cigarette butts. And on the bed beside her, a familiar figure was curled up.

“Oh, hey babe,” she greeted blearily, woken up by the sound of the opening door. She blinked a few times and wiped the crust out of her eyes while Eggsy gaped at her in disbelief and outrage.

Her eyes were glassy and unfocused, telling signs of more than a hangover, and Eggsy had to reign in the urge to scream at her and beat the man who shared her bed.

“What,” he whispered dangerously instead. “The Fuck. Is _he_. Doing. Here?” She frowned in confusion before she turned to Dean who still slept beside her.

Her eyes then widened.

“What the FUCK is ‘e doin’ ‘ere, mum?!” Eggsy finally yelled, startling Dean into wakefulness. Eggsy didn’t allow him a moment to gain his bearings. He rounded the bed and hauled Dean up to his feet, slamming him against the wall by his throat. The man panicked and tried to fight back, but Eggsy had years of Kingsman training and missions under his belt--Dean didn’t stand a chance.

“What the _fuck_ are you doing in _my_ house?!” he yelled.

The man scrabbled at the hand that squeezed his neck before squeaking out. “It’s yer mum’s ‘ouse, ain’t it? An’ she invited me in.” So Eggsy punched him across the face. Hard.

“It’s _my_ house, so get the _fuck_ out of here before I tear your spine out of your throat!” Eggsy snarled at the moaning man.

Dean spat blood on the carpet and drew himself up to full height, trying to look as menacing as he could and drawing on the years of threat and submission he forced on Eggsy. But Eggsy wasn’t that scared little boy anymore. He had dealt with the worst that mankind had to offer, men like Serghei Bogdan. He wasn’t afraid of Dean any longer. 

“Look at you,” Dean sneered. “All ‘igh and mighty just coz you got yerself some sugar daddy fattening up yer pockets an’ stuffin’ yer ‘ole.” He drew closer, nearly nose to nose with Eggsy who _dared_ him with his eyes to make a move. “You may be makin’ yerself some decent money now, boy, but we all know you’s is nothin’ but a cowerin’ little slag underneath it all.”

“Get. _Out_ ,” Eggsy whispered with nary an inflection in his voice.

Dean did.

“Eggsy, babe,” his mum whispered, so Eggsy shot her a scathing glare.

“Why did you invite him here?” he asked, quiet and trembling with rage and betrayal.

“Eggsy, I just--Well, I was lonely, weren’t I? An’--an’ maybe I missed ‘im,” she tried to explain, but it wasn’t good enough. It wasn’t. Good. Enough.

“Mum, yer drunk, yer ‘igh, and you just slept with the man that made our lives a living _hell_ fer over a decade,” Eggsy growled. “I’m taking Daisy with me until you can fuckin’ sort yerself out.”

“Eggsy--”

But Eggsy didn't want to hear whatever protest she had. He promised her, in no uncertain terms, “And if I ever find that fucking man in this house or within ten feet of you and me and Dais ever again, I _will_ kill him.”


	6. Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eggsy finally catches a fucking break. And then he doesn't.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We can't make Eggsy too happy, right? Because plot. Right? _Right_? 
> 
> **Warnings for graphic imagery towards the end.** And possibly also plotholes because I suck at plot and mystery. When you find any, you should just, you know, shush your mouth and go with it XD
> 
> UNBETA'D!

“So, uh, I should probably apologize fer movin’ our night out ‘ere today,” Eggsy started as they settled into their seats. “But seein’ as it took literally ‘alf an hour to drag Ryan away from the aquarium, I don’t think yer too gutted we ain’t drinkin’ tonight, are ye, lads?” He gave Ryan a pointed look, but the blonde only grinned unabashedly.

“Cuz, we can go down to the Prince anytime. But how often do we get to eat at _this place_? It’s brill!” he said, referring to the Rainforest Cafe, a restaurant in Piccadilly Circus that was made to look like an actual rainforest. Not that it was anything like it because Eggsy had been to actual rainforests and none of them had elephants in them. Not to mention there was a distinct lack of mosquitoes here that would have made the experience authentic. Nevertheless, there was a childish glee in him that made Eggsy decide that it had been a good decision.

“And that I’m payin’ fer it all probably ‘elps, ey?”

“Mate, we been ridin’ on yer good fortune since V-Day. You ain’t gettin’ away with that guilt card _now_ ,” Jamal tossed back, so Eggsy laughed and shoved him with his shoulder.

“Oi, the girls are back,” Ryan pointed out, and Eggsy and Jamal looked over their shoulders to see Roxy guiding a beaming Daisy by the hand toward their table.

“I saw an el’phant, Eggsy!” Daisy squealed as she ran the rest of the way to him. Eggsy caught her before she could slam her head against the corner of the table.

“Did ya now?” he asked, her grin infectious. “‘Ow big wos it? Did it stomp you wiv its massive feet?”

“No, silly Eggsy!” Daisy answered. “Auntie Rox woulda saved me, won’t she?”

“‘Course she would. Auntie Rox is the _best_ ,” Eggsy agreed, getting a kiss on the cheek for his trouble when Roxy passed him on her way to Ryan’s side of the table.

“Budge up, would you?” she told the boy who was making silly faces at Daisy. He did without any kind of protest, and once that she was settled, Roxy asked, “So when’s _Pierce_ joining us?”

Eggsy ignored her teasing tone and strapped Daisy into the high chair. She was getting a little too big for one, but the adult chairs would have been too low for her. He pressed a kiss to the top of her head and checked his phone. “‘E’s jus’ outside ‘e says. ‘E’ll be up in a bit.” Then he looked deeply into each one of his friend’s eyes and said to them in his gravest, most serious voice, “You _will not_ embarrass me in front of Pierce.” All three of them gave him matching grins that told him he was in for a hell of a night. “Dicks,” he grumbled under his breath and then paled when Daisy shouted, “Eggsy said ‘dicks’!”

Roxy, Jamal, and Ryan roared with laughter while Eggsy furiously tried to shush her.

“That’s a bad word, Eggsy,” Daisy said in the sternest possible tone a toddler could muster, which was the cutest thing in the world.

“Yer right, flowah. Big bruv’s a bad boy,” he agreed solemnly.

“Might big bruv need a bit of punishment then?” unexpectedly came a cool, refined voice from behind him, and for the _barest_ of seconds, Eggsy expected to turn around and find Harry standing behind him. His three friends continued to rib him while his heart thudded in his chest, and thankfully, it took only a split second for him to remember that Pierce was his date tonight and to remind himself once more that _Harry was dead_.

He tipped his head back over the back of the bench so that he could see Pierce, albeit upside down, and with a besotted smile on his face that he didn’t need to fake, greeted “Hullo.”

“Hello, Eggsy,” Pierce greeted back. He petted Eggsy’s hair and--putting a blush on Eggsy’s face--kissed his forehead.

For a split second, Eggsy saw it--in his mind and on Pierce's face--the life they could have with each other, the lazy mornings they would share in the kitchen of Pierce's flat, the heated evenings curled up around each other in his loft, days out in amusement parks they would have to indulge Daisy, and Sunday roasts with his mum. His mum was going to love Pierce, he knew, and they would be _happy_.

In the four months since they’d bumped into each other--literally!--in the tube station, he and Pierce had yet to get anywhere real in their relationship, but in that instant, Eggsy _knew_ what he wanted, and he knew he was going to do what it took to have it.

Pierce lifted an eyebrow at him, but grinned. "Do I have something on my face?" he asked.

Eggsy mimicked his smile and shook his head. "Nah, you're good," was his answer, and he didn’t mean the cleanliness of Pierce’s face. 

He righted himself to find Ryan, Jamal, and Roxy wiggling their eyebrows at him. He ignored it. "Guys, this is Pierce. Pierce, the guys: Ryan, Jamal, and Roxy." Eggsy waited until they all had all shaken hands in turn before turning to Daisy. "And this adorable little creature here is the reason why we're all sitting in the Rainforest Cafe and not a pub. This is Daisy. Say hi to Pierce, Dais," he instructed.

Pierce crouched down to her level and held out a hand to shake. "That's quite all right, Miss Daisy." He took her hand in his and shook it. Then in a loud whisper, he added, "I quite like the Rainforest Cafe better myself rather than some stinky old pub."

Daisy giggled and shook his hand some more in the enthusiastic way toddlers do. "Are you Eggsy's boyfriend?" she asked, which stunned Eggsy in surprise and embarrassment, but only made Pierce chuckle and lean in closer to her.

"Well, Miss Daisy," he whispered conspiratorially, "I'm trying to be, and I think if you told me what his _favorite_ things are in the whole world, I could give them to him and maybe he'll say yes." His eyes flickered up to Eggsy's and he winked, so Eggsy, utterly and madly charmed, mouthed an emphatic 'Yes!' over the top of Daisy's head. Pierce’s smile was blinding as the sun, and he leaned over to kiss Eggsy solidly on the mouth, regardless of the toddler between them and Eggsy's nosy friends making faces across from them.

It wasn't difficult for Pierce to charm the three of them as much as he endeared himself to Eggsy. He gave his two cents when needed, teased lightly, and regaled some of his more humorous cases to them. He listened to their stories, asked all the right questions, and offered proper commentary. He didn't even bat an eye when Ryan asked how the best way to get away with a crime was.

Roxy had whacked the boy over the head for that one, but Pierce only laughed, leaned in, and whispered, "Connections and a _bloody_ good barrister." Which technically wasn't true because both Eggsy and Roxy had taken out bad men with hordes of both, but neither were going to correct him.

When Daisy started yawning, signalling that the night was up, Pierce stood and politely bade his farewells to all three of them before, finally, to Eggsy.

"Oh, that's not necessary," Roxy interrupted when he did.

"Pardon?" Pierce asked.

"Roxy's taking Daisy for the night," Eggsy admitted, a little embarrassed, especially when Ryan and Jamal started snickering. "I thought we, uh, could have some coffee?"

"And we all know what _that_ stands for," Jamal whispered loudly, so Eggsy jabbed him with an elbow.

Pierce obviously understood where they were headed. His smile only grew wider, and he gave a small laugh. "Coffee sounds great," he agreed.

So Ryan suddenly crowed, "Our boy's getting _laid_ tonight!" Eggsy resisted the urge to stuff his mouth with paper napkins, and instead sent him the most withering glare he could muster, signing, when Pierce turned to say his goodbyes once more to Daisy, that Ryan was _dead_.

"Oh shut up, you tit!" Roxy hissed on his behalf, for which Eggsy was thankful. He turned to Daisy now that Roxy had his two wayward best friends under control.

"Big bruv's gonna say bye now, Dais, okay? Yer gonna have a lovely sleepover with Auntie Rox, won't you?" he asked. She only nodded silently, rubbing her droopy eyes, and allowed Eggsy to kiss her forehead.

When he did, he stood turned to Pierce, tilting his head toward the door. "Shall we?" he asked. The older man nodded and took his hand and pressed a kiss to the back of it.

……………

The cab ride from the restaurant to Pierce's flat was filled with the good kind of tension, with shy smiles and hesitant touches, with casual conversation that seemed to be a good thing because Eggsy was ready to climb into Pierce’s lap merely three blocks from the restaurant. As it was, he managed to hold off until they reached Pierce’s building, up the elevator, and to Pierce’s door where their control promptly ran out.

Pierce pressed him face first up against the door, holding him there with his body while he slid the keys neatly into the slot, having learnt from the first time they did this that kissing comes _after_ getting inside. Eggsy only laughed and pushed his arse against the front of Pierce’s trousers to tease him. The man groaned and bit at his neck just before the door swung inwards, and Eggsy managed to dance out of his reach.

“C’mere, old man,” he purred and reeled Pierce in by his necktie, finding his mouth with his own. He had to tilt his head back and lean up to kiss him, but that was exactly how Eggsy wanted it.

Pierce walked him backwards into the living room, refusing to part lips until the back of Eggsy’s legs caught the arm of the couch and they both tumbled over it with a shouted “Oh!” and half a dozen laughs.

“Hi,” Eggsy murmured, drawing his eyelids low over his eyes. His hand was still twisted around Pierce’s tie which he use to keep the other man within kissing distance.

“Hello, my darling,” Pierce answered before pressing gentle pecks onto the younger man’s lips which Eggsy soon enough turned into a full-blown kiss. Pierce indulged him, even rocking his hips into Eggsy’s until they were gasping each other’s names into their mouths. Then he asked, “Will you run away from me again?” 

Eggsy shook his head and started undoing Pierce’s tie and shirt buttons. “Take me to bed,” he purred with promise heavy in his voice.

Pierce did as told, hauling him up and off the couch and seducing him with more kisses of the French kind towards the stairs and up them.

Clothes marked the way they took, like a breadcrumb trail leading back down to the living room, but there was no one to follow it because Eggsy was _ecstatic_ to find himself being lowered into the bed and held there by an equally naked body on top of his.

His hands roved the planes of Pierce’s body, cataloguing every inch of it. Though there was a softness to him brought about by age, he was by no means out of shape. Eggsy could trace with his fingers the lines of his muscle that spoke about a delineation and bulk gentled by time. They scraped through the wiry thatch of hair on his chest, thumbed a nipple, and followed the trailed to his generous cock which Eggsy wrapped a hand around with little preamble.

His eyes glinted when a small grunt escaped Pierce.

“Have you come to a decision?” the older man asked. He tried to sound suave about it, but his hips were rocking into Eggsy’s grip and his voice was marginally strangled, so Eggsy grinned wickedly.

“A decision about what?” he returned, smug and cocky, so Pierce grabbed his hand and pinned it to the bed, away from their bodies, and with another small grunt, he _thrust_ his cock into the crevice of Eggsy’s groin.

The boy cried out, bucking into Pierce and begging with his body for more. He almost didn’t mind when Pierce took on his smug tone when he clarified, “About how is it you wanted me to take you.”

“Anyway,” Eggsy moaned, thrusting up when Pierce pressed down. “Anything. _Please_.” So Pierce pushed his legs apart and settled himself in between.

He leaned over Eggsy to grab what Eggsy assumed was lube in the nightstand. His position put his nipple right in front of Eggsy’s face and so he leaned up and licked at it, garnering him a moan from the man. Pierce froze in place, which Eggsy took to mean permission to continue, so he lifted his head and nipped and suckled at it, teasing and stimulating in all the best ways he knew how, and when Pierce had finally had enough, Eggsy found his mouth plundered and ravaged.

“You beautiful thing,” Pierce moaned, just before two of his fingers pushed into Eggsy’s hole.

“Oh!” Eggsy gasped. His legs drew up to his sides of their own accord, giving Pierce room to finger his arse open. “Oh!” he cried out when a third joined the first two. He clawed at Pierce’s back, desperate, desperate for more. “Please!” he begged when he’d had enough.

“All right, all right, love,” the man answered and then a glorious, thick cock was filling Eggsy up.

There was a flash of thought, when Pierce had finally bottomed out in him, that remembered that not a month ago he’d been brutalized on a mission gone horribly, terribly wrong. What did that say about him, he wondered briefly, that he still felt this desperate to let Pierce have him?

It said that he was a man that knew of the perils of his profession and accepted that there was a high percentage of their possible occurrence in his life. It said he was a man that was trained and able to physically, emotionally, intellectually handle such perils. It said that he had successfully received help from people that were supposed to heal his body as well as his mind. It said that he was ready to move on with his life and that Pierce was the man he could move on with.

With that in mind, he grabbed Pierce by the back of his neck and kissed him over and over and over again until they came gasping into each other’s mouths.

Later, they lay entwined around each other, kissing lazily and doing not much more that breathe in the other when Eggsy’s phone chirped from the floor where he had dropped it. 

“Leave it,” Pierce pleaded, tightening his grip around Eggsy who only laughed and pressed a kiss to his collarbone. He would have been hard pressed to find the will to answer it himself if it had not been the ringtone he set to announce that he was urgently needed in the office, so he feigned nonchalance and wiggled out of Pierce’s arms.

“‘Lo,” he said into the receiver, uncaring of his nudity beyond the look of appreciation it put on Pierce’s face.

“Galahad, you’re needed at the shop. Right now,” came Merlin’s grave voice. Immediately, Eggsy’s whole body tensed, though he tried to hide it from Pierce by turning away from him.

“What’s up?”

“It’s best discussed here,” Merlin answered and hung up.

Eggsy quickly dialled Roxy. “Did Merlin call you?” he asked in a low voice.

“No, he didn’t. Is something the matter?” she asked. “I can bring Daisy.”

“Nah, don’t worry about it. I’m sure it’s nothing. I’ll let you know,” Eggsy answered and hung up after brief goodbyes. He turned back to Pierce who was watching him with a concerned frown on his face.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, so Eggsy sauntered back over to the bed and pressed a warm kiss to his mouth.

“Fussy customer needs some readjustments to a suit I made. It’s urgent ‘e says,” he explained.

“At eight in the evening?” Pierce asked, disbelieving.

“Oh you won’t _believe_ the entitlement some of our customers think they’re owed,” Eggsy said with a roll of his eyes while he tugged on his pants and jeans. “But then again, when they’re spending minimum eight hundred quid on a set, it’s best not to chase ‘em off, yeah?” Pierce grimaced and nodded in agreement.

“Too right,” he said and accepted another long, lingering kiss from Eggsy.

“Tonight was fantastic,” Eggsy murmured to reassure him. “It’s definitely gonna happen again, don’t you worry, luv, all right?”

“All right,” the older man said with a smile that Eggsy couldn’t not kiss again. And then he was running out of the flat before he took any more time because there was a gravity in Merlin’s voice that professed of Very Bad Things, but if Roxy hadn’t been called in, it can’t have been one of the agents coming back in a box.

A Kingsman cab was waiting for him at the foot of the building when he emerged. He didn’t question it. He didn’t have to. He just climbed in and allowed it to take him to the shop where Merlin and Arthur were waiting for him in the dining room. Both of them wore the same grim expressions on their faces that made Eggsy sit down in his chair the moment he was close enough.

“Elaine’s dead,” was what Arthur decided the best conversation starter was.

Immediately, Eggsy felt sick.

“What?” he asked, looking to Merlin for confirmation.

Arthur spoke before Merlin could respond. “She was found in the basement of a pub I believe you’re quite familiar with. The Black Prince?”

The words startled Eggsy so badly that he shot to his feet and was two steps to the door to investigate for himself before he stopped, realizing something, and turned to Arthur sharply.

“It wasn’t me,” he felt he needed to say with the exact urgency to let him know his sincerity. He glanced between the both of them to gauge their reactions. When both didn’t move a muscle, he repeated, “I wasn’t anywhere _near_ the Prince today.”

“We believe you, lad,” Merlin said quickly.

“We want to,” Arthur amended. “But all this is terribly convenient, is it not? You, Roxanne, and your two friends usually have your nights out at the Black Prince. Why did you move to a different location today?”

“Because I have my sister with me! Why _would_ I go to a pub with ‘er?” Eggsy very nearly shouted.

“Miss Daisy Baker who you took from her mother after you threatened to kill her father?” Arthur asked like he already knew the answer. He most likely did; that didn’t surprise Eggsy. It angered him mostly that Arthur was trying to imply Dean’s innocence.

“She was high, and he’s been out of our lives since V-Day. He don’t got no claim on Daisy. I took ‘er because my mum was in no state to take care of ‘er, and ‘er _father_ is a piece of shit that I wouldn’t trust with a fly, much less my sister,” Eggsy spat.

Arthur flicked a look and a nod at Merlin who tapped at his clipboard, and then an image lit up the false mirror above the mantle.

The sight of it made Eggsy shut up and pale. He fell back into his seat, shocked and horrified all at once, heaving deep breaths to keep the sick at bay.

“My God…” he whispered as his eyes started to burn.

It was the image of Elaine hung from her wrists in the basement of the Prince--somewhere Eggsy had been a few times before and recognized on sight. Her legs were strung apart and her body on full display for anyone who wished to look. Below her was the same kind of machine Eggsy had been subjected to back in Bogdan’s room, no doubt performing the same kind of action on her. Her body bore bruises and wounds and whiplashes that were almost an exact representation of the ones on Eggsy when they’d finally extracted him, all except for one change: all of her fingers had been cut off and laid down meticulously in front of her.

“I--I didn’t…” he said, though his denial felt less important right now than going out and retrieving his friend’s body and helping put it back to rights to preserve her dignity and her memory. “I can’t have--” He turned to Merlin. “I wouldn’t. She was my _friend_.”

‘I know, lad,’ Merlin’s eyes said. “We’re working as fast as possible to find out what’s happening,” was what his mouth did. “We’ll uncover this, Eggsy. We will.”

“But in the meantime,” Arthur interjected. “You will be put under constant surveillance from the moment you leave your home. For now, you’re benched until investigations are concluded. Your sister will be returned to her mother--” Arthur held up a hand to silence Eggsy’s protests. “--And a restraining order put in place to keep Mr. Dean Baker from coming close to either of them. You are advised to remain at home until further notice, although we cannot keep you there against your will.”

A little more kindly, Arthur said, “I do want to believe you, Galahad. But I must do what needs to be done.”

It was only because of that that Eggsy nodded in acquiescence.


	7. Falling to Pieces

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think I promised someone Harry would be in this chapter.
> 
> I'm sorry, he isn't :S He'll be in next one though if he ever bothers _showing up at all Harry you fucking prick can you, for once in your damned life show up when you're supposed to??_ *sigh*
> 
> I'm sorry, Eggsy.

Nobody could have stopped him from attending Elaine’s funeral, not Roxy, not Merlin, not Arthur, not even the wary and moderately fearful looks thrown his way by the Kingsman staff who knew the story behind her death.

He watched them lower her casket to the ground and the first pile of soil thrown onto it. He stayed until the last one was thrown even when the family had already thanked everyone for coming and everyone else had already filed out.

“Are you a friend of hers?” Elaine’s father, a kindly, weathered man whose anguished-filled eyes Eggsy would never forget.

“I am,” he answered simply.

And then he reached into his pocket and drew out a card.

Arthur had rejected his request to offer Elaine’s family a favour, like Harry had done Eggsy’s family those many years ago. In the first place, such blank checks were only offered to passed _agents’_ families, not to everyone in the organization. In another, they were only given in very special circumstances. Death was a part of life at Kingsman, after all--it wouldn’t do to hand out favours willy nilly and indebt the organization to the families of failed agents.

It didn’t stop him, however, from handing out a personal favour.

“I would like to offer your family a… gift,” he told the father while the mother watched them curiously. “Elaine was a very dear person to me, and I would like to make sure you are cared for. What I offer you is a favour, anything of your choosing, anything you need--connections, money, assistance, a job, _anything_ \--and I shall endeavour to do my best and grant it to you.”

Her father read the name on the business card, flipped it over briefly though there was nothing to find on the back, and then looked up at Eggsy with tears starting to run once more down his face.

“ _Thank you_ ,” he said emphatically. Eggsy only clasped his shoulder and gave him a tight nod to express his condolences, then left the family at the cemetery to grieve.

Halfway to the cemetery gates, he pulled out his mobile and sent Pierce a text.

//Coming over, babe,// it said before pocketing his phone. He glanced once more at the family in the distance huddled around the mound of soil that was once Eggsy’s friend and handler. 

There was something at play here that Eggsy had yet to figure out, someone framing him, but for what he didn’t know. However, frankly, the most concerning part was not that he was suspended indefinitely from work and not that one of his friends had died a gruesome death, for which he was being blamed, but that someone _knew_ him and knew the organization he worked for enough to know, at the very least, who he was, who he worked with, the missions he took, and the results of such.

Eggsy believed Arthur had already gotten a grasp of such concern and was working with Merlin to figure it out. He believed his suspension was more precautionary than anything. He _had_ to believe that was the case because if it turned out Arthur was simply acting on willful ignorance, or worse, he was actively trying to sabotage Kingsman… 

Well, Eggsy had already done away with an Arthur once.

With that in mind, he hailed a cab--non-Kingsman issued in light of his suspension--greeted the cabbie who he’d never met in his life but knew, with certainty, was a Kingsman employee, and asked him to take him to the firm of Crawford and Cunningham.

//Not now. Text later,// came Pierce's response just as he passed a police car parked right in front of the front doors of the office building. Eggsy’s brow furrowed in concern, but he was already downstairs, might as well see what help he could offer. He got into the lift with half a dozen people and exited after half had already gotten off, before finding himself greeted with the troubled face of Pierce's secretary.

“Mr. Eggsy,” she greeted, and Eggsy resisted the urge to wince. After a while of convincing, she'd eventually acquiesced to refer to him by his moniker than his last name, but refused to drop the “mr.”

“Pierce in?” he asked, tipping his chin up in the general direction of Pierce's office as more of a way to make conversation than any true need to know. She threw a glance quickly in the same direction and bit her lip.

“This really isn’t a good time for Mr. Crawford,” she said. “He asked me to tell you, if you came, that he’ll get in touch with you when he’s free.” Eggsy sent a concerned frown toward the direction of his boyfriend, mentally debating whether or not to go in anyway. He turned back to the receptionist for more information, but without prompting, she leaned forward and added in a low tone, “He’s got Mr. Cunningham and the police in there with him. It looks serious.”

To that, Eggsy fished his phone out and dialled Merlin.

As soon as the line clicked open, he said, “Can you find out for me why the police would be visiting Pierce?” before Merlin even had the chance to say hello. Not that he would have, really.

There was a small ‘tsch’ over the line and then silence because clicking keyboards were an artifact in Merlin’s lair. He’d long since switched over to the holographic type that wouldn’t give his conversation partner any distractions or clues to his activities.

Eggsy waited in equal silence because it wouldn’t do to earn Merlin’s ire when he was asking for a personal favour. He did wander away from the receptionist a bit to avoid being overheard, but he was a common enough fixture in the office that she soon ignored him in favor of her actual tasks.

It only took a few seconds more before Merlin suddenly hummed thoughtfully, which was as telling as it was worrying. Then he said, “It seems he has a warrant of arrest for bribery relating to Cunningham’s divorce case.”

Eggsy paled. “No,” he said in disbelief. Pierce wouldn’t have. _Wouldn’t_.

Would he?

He looked up when a commotion broke out in the offices, and Pierce walked out, his head held high, but fear and worry and shame shimmered in his eyes. Two officers flanked him while Cunningham brought up the rear, and all around them, heads peeked over cubicle walls to follow their trek down the aisle.

“Pierce,” Eggsy called out when he was in earshot. The attention of all four men snapped to him, and the barrister suddenly visibly deflated. “What’s--I mean… How can I help?”

“Young man,” Cunningham answered on Pierce’s behalf, his voice an angry thunder that neither scared nor intimidated Eggsy, though it tried. “It would do you well to distance yourself from dishonest, thieving men like this one.”

Eggsy blatantly ignored him, all his attention turned to Pierce whose shoulders drooped and head fell forward, refusing to look at Eggsy. It was a telling sign that had Eggsy’s heart seize. “It’s true?” he asked, silently begging for it not to be.

“I…” Pierce murmured softly. “I’m sorry, Eggsy.” And then he was guided firmly out of the lobby and into an awaiting lift.

Eggsy dialled Merlin once more.

“Is it?” he asked shortly, still staring in blank shock and disbelief at the stainless steel doors.

Merlin’s voice was subdued and apologetic when he said, “Aye, lad, I’m sorry.”

Eggsy only ground his teeth and tightened his grip on his phone. He wasn’t ready to take this at face value just yet because everything else that was happening was _just. too. convenient_. Even with Pierce’s admission, even with Merlin’s confirmation, it was simply too coincidental to be real. 

Once more the ugly head of suspicion reared itself, trying to draw lines between the dots that were his recent missions, Elaine’s death, and now this.

He said nothing about it just yet to the man on the phone. He needed to think, he needed time to consider his options, his courses of action. Merlin, Roxy… he trusted them with his life, but they would want him to stand down while they figured this out for him, and he _can’t_. 

“Thank you, Merlin,” he only said before hanging up and riding the lift back down to the street. He flagged down another non-Kingsman cab, greeted the Kingsman driver, and gave him the address of his mum’s flat. 

With everything falling apart in his life, he just… needed his mum right now.

…………....

The flat was a mess reminiscent of their days at the Estates. 

As soon as Eggsy opened the door and the stench of cigarette smoke blew in his face, he leaped over bottles strewn about and ran towards Daisy’s room. He flung the door open, ignoring the crack into the wall behind it because the room was _fucking empty_.

His heart thudded in his chest as he ran towards his mum’s room.

Like on the day he’d met Pierce, she was once more sprawled across the bed in her clothes from the night before, make-up smeared across her face, and bottles scattered among the refuse that included powder-lined credit cards, syringes, cigarettes, and two other friends, and yet Daisy was nowhere in sight.

He grabbed her by her upper arms, hauling her up and frantically shaking her awake.

“Where’s Daisy?!” he yelled, desperate, _terrified_. “MUM, WHERE’S DAISY?!”

Michelle groaned, her head lolling about, still drunk, still high. “Go ‘way,” she slurred, trying to push Eggsy back, but he held tight.

“Mum! Mum! Daisy’s gone, where is she??” he demanded, shaking her until over and over again. “Did you bring her with you last night? Where did you go??”

“Stoppit,” she whined. “Movies. ‘S’all. We wenna watch tha’ new one… finnin’... finnin’...” Then she trailed away without finishing her thought, sleep taking over. 

“After? After?” Eggsy prompted, shaking her awake once more.

“Egg…” She broke off with a laugh before it quickly turned into a choking cough. “Egg… Swanky place an’ a line a mile long, but wos a man got us through. Says it’s coz I’ve the prettiest eyes, ‘is fav’rite color. Ain’t ‘e sweet, Eggs? ‘E got the prettiest eyes too. Like ‘em choc’lits.” Then she laughed again,

Eggsy wanted to slap her awake, but refrained on account of her being his mother. “Egg what? Egg London? Did you go to Egg London? Did you take Daisy there? Who was the man?” She only groaned once more and pushed him away by is chest.

"Do' 'member. go 'way, babes. 'M tired, 'kay?" She succeeded in freeing herself from him but only because he allowed her to. He threw himself toward the door with a shouted, "Fuck!" and then fished his phone out once more, hitting 'redial' on his way out the door.

"Separation anxiety, Eggsy?" Merlin asked dryly when he answered.

"Daisy's gone," Eggsy said, trying to keep the panic he felt out of his voice. "I'm at my mum's, and Daisy's not here. Mum's high as a kite, can barely stay awake for more than a few minutes, and _Daisy's gone_ , Merlin!"

"Calm down, lad," Merlin said gently, but Eggsy could hear the urgency beginning to form in his voice. He flew down the stairs like a pack of gunmen were on his tail and barrelled into the first cab he saw, a Kingsman one this time. He didn't ask.

"Egg London," he told the driver who needed no further instructions. To Merlin, Eggsy continued, "Mum says she took Daisy out to watch Finding Dory last night and, somehow, ended up at Egg London where some guy let her and her friends in. I don't know at what point Daisy got separated from her. Merlin. Merlin, find her _please_!"

"Alright, alright, lad, I'm working on it," Merlin answered, the calm in the storm of Eggsy's panic and fear.

The ride was a blur of heartbeat thuds in Eggsy's ears that he counted to keep from screaming. Merlin issued soft commands over the line to available techies that had them scouring private and public security cameras from last night.

"I have your mum in front of Egg London," he finally said. "Sending you the feed now."

Eggsy watched in silence his mum and her friends talking to a man who stood just out of view. Daisy was held in her arms, and she repeatedly shook her head, but soon enough smiled bashfully, likely when the man called her eyes pretty. After some cajoling by her friends, she finally seemed to agree to go inside. The man was never seen in the camera, so Eggsy said, "Any other angles? I can't see him."

"Unfortunately not. He managed to find all the blind spots of the cameras along that street," Merlin answered, a touch frustrated. It was worrying because few men were aware enough to be able to hide themselves in the blind spots of security cameras.

"On purpose?" Eggsy asked.

"I can't tell."

The feed fast forwarded three hours later to his mum stumbling out into the street, laughing with her friends.  
Sans Daisy.

"She never came out," Eggsy voiced, rather unhelpfully, really, but no one called him out on it. "Can you get me the feed inside the club?" Merlin made a noise of acknowledgement as he complied just as the cab stopped outside the club.

It was dead silent as clubs tended to be in the daytime. Eggsy sat silent in the cab in front of it for a moment, watching the feed move in his glasses. Merlin helpfully highlighted Michelle and Daisy who seated themselves in a booth near the bar. Michelle's friends went to dance, but mother and daughter remained seated, working on the contents of a soda. A few people stopped by to speak to her, and her facial reactions said that the words varied from flattery and flirtation to reprimand for having brought a child to a club. Eggsy was going to have Words with her himself for putting both of them in a dangerous situation, but _after_. After he got Daisy back.

At quarter to nine, Michelle took Daisy to the ladies' room where she spent the next thirty minutes. There was no camera inside, naturally, so Eggsy had no idea what had happened before she came back out, laughing and wavering on her feet without Daisy, very obviously drugged, though whether it was by her own doing or not was much less clear.

"Find me the people that came to speak with her as well as those standing by the bar alone," Eggsy said as he alighted the cab and walked toward the club with nary a hesitance. 

A security guard halted him at the door. Eggsy only glared at him.

"My mum lost my sister here last night," he said, his voice carefully neutral. "You _will_ let me in to check or I _will_ make this difficult for you." His body was tensed, both from the flurry of emotions swirling inside him and from his battle readiness in case the guard remained stubborn and needed to be dealt with, but Merlin spoke before any escalation could happen.

"There's no need for that, lad," he said. "We found her."

Relief suddenly coursed through Eggsy with all the finesse of a bucket of water dumped on him, visibly deflating him as all his anger and panic receded in a single breath.

"Where?" he demanded, climbing back into the cab without further word to the guard.

Curiously, it was with hesitance that Merlin said, "Lad, maybe we should send someone else to collect her."

Eggsy frowned. "Where is she, Merlin?" he repeated, careful not to let the anger and wariness show.

" _Eggsy_ ," the other insisted. "She seems safe enough, but it wouldn't be good for you to involve yourself in collecting her. I can send someone to bring her to your home in half an hour, no less. Go home, Eggsy. We'll handle this."

"Just tell me where the _fuck_ she is, Merlin!" Eggsy demanded, temper flaring at Merlin's avoidance.

The other man only sighed a heavy breath and, after a beat, answered, "At Baker's flat."

Astonishment at the utter _gall_ of his stepfather floored Eggsy. 

After he had threatened him, after Kingsman had processed his restraining order, he couldn't _believe_ Dean was confident enough-- _stupid_ enough to cross him. 

Granted, he didn't quite know just how powerful Eggsy was, yes, but Eggsy resolved that by the time he walked out of the flat with Daisy? Dean wasn't quite going to forget.

"Alexandria Road Estates," he told his driver.

...............

He'd had all of a day with Daisy--a normal day filled with normal activities and laughter and bubbles and sloppy puppy kisses and absolutely no danger and drama whatsoever--before it all came to an abrupt halt, as Eggsy expected it would. He didn't mind. A day with her was worth a month of anything else, so he was thankful for having even just that day.

It started with the banging of a fist on his front door, which, after putting the napping Daisy he held in his arms down on her bed, he opened without hesitation because who had he to fear?

Except that he realized the one person he _did_ fear stood in his doorway. 

And she was _livid_.

"What did you _do_ , Eggsy?" Roxy hissed, sweeping into the room like an angry cat.

"Shush," he reprimanded, ignoring her for now because it was obvious what he did. "Daisy's sleeping." Roxy ignored that and grabbed the front of his shirt to drag him down to her eye level.

"Why the _hell_ didn't you let Merlin handle Dean?" she demanded, even angrier than before, which was starting to grow concerning. After everything she learned about his stepfather, she should have been singing his praises, or at the very least, giving him a mere slap on the wrist and then plotting his next move with him, not flashing angry eyes at him and snarling into his face.

"Daisy's _my_ responsibility, not his. She's mine to protect," Eggsy answered. He might have been a little defensive about it, but pummeling Dean into a pulp to remind him of the terms of his restraining order had been, admittedly, more than a little satisfying. "It's a personal matter, and Merlin--or any of the staff at Kingsman--shouldn't be asked to deal with it."

"You _idiot_!" Roxy snapped in an uncharacteristic show of disloyalty. "Merlin's your friend. _I'm_ your friend; we would have helped you whether or not it's Kingsman business. You should have let us handle it! And now everything's all been mucked up and neither of us can answer for you for it!"

Eggsy frowned. "What do you mean 'mucked up'?"

Roxy let out a ragged breath. "Merlin and I trust you _implicitly_ , but none of the others have the bond you and I quite share, and so they're starting to doubt you. Now more than ever because after you entered Dean's flat, surveillance on you quite literally winked out of existence!"

"Come off it," Eggsy scoffed, folding his arms over his chest. "No one in the Round Table can claim total innocence. We've all used our skills sets in our personal lives."

"But none of us have ever killed outside of missions before!" Roxy exclaimed. Eggsy paled, but she continued. "Ector was tasked to keep his eye on you, but he doesn't remember _anything_ after picking you up at Egg London, and none of Merlin and his grunts can find anything _anywhere_ to prove that you didn't do it, so Arthur's sent out Bors and Gawain to pick you up and take you to the mansion for further investigation, and I _can't. do. anything_!"

"Rox..." Eggsy whispered, understanding slowly dawning on him.

"Dean's dead, Eggsy," Roxy concluded grimly. "He's dead, and as far as Arthur can see, _you_ tortured and murdered Dean Baker, and no one can prove otherwise."

Eggsy was sure he was gaping like a starved fish, but he couldn't quite find the right words or tone to convey that he didn't _kill Dean_. He roughed him up a lot, yeah, but _he wasn't a murderer_.

"But I didn't..."

" _I_ know that, but _he_ doesn't. Or at least, he won't until he get evidence to the contrary," Roxy said. 

And here it was. All Eggsy's suspicions started to come out and culminate into a working theory, although there were still holes bigger than his head that needed to be filled. For one: why? More importantly: who and how?

"Rox," he said anyway. There was an urgency in him for her to believe him that wasn't there before. Logically, he knew that she did, he _knew_ it, but for some reason, he needed to insist it, he needed her to know for _sure_. " _Rox_. I think someone's trying to frame me. Someone who knows Kingsman, maybe someone inside Kingsman," Eggsy told her. 

"I know, Eggs. I can put two and two together as well. Merlin's looking into it; he and Nimue have been working day and night on it since the Gregore mission. We believe you, but they've been coming up with more questions than answers right from the very start," Roxy explained. She pulled him into her arms. "I'm sorry, Eggsy, but there isn't very much we can do. Not unless you can get Daisy to testify that you didn't kill her dad."

"You." Eggsy swallowed a lump in his throat. "You need to take her to Ryan or Jamal. Mum's not capable of handling her right now. I... I should go deal with Arthur."

Roxy hugged him again. "We'll get to the bottom of this, Eggs. We're _spies_ ; we'll get the information we need. I promise." He only nodded numbly and packed Daisy's bag so that Roxy could take her to Jamal's. Then he fixed himself a drink and sat himself down to wait for Bors and Gawain to collect him.

And later on, fell asleep to the image of chocolate eyes dancing in his mind.


	8. Double-Edged Sword

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No, I have not forgotten this, but the last two months had been So. _Fucking_. Trying that I cannot even begin to explain how awful they were. I won't bore you with any sob stories (because frankly, it's a boring story anyway), but _Jesus_. I must have done something positively _atrocious_ in a past life.
> 
> I can't promise the next chapter will be up soon, but hopefully those who are still following this enjoy this chapter anyway. 
> 
> I've been trying to work on A Changed Man as well, but I'm stuck on the next chapter. It was just supposed to be fluff before moving on to the next plot point, but it's not going too well. I tried writing more installments for the Lifeline 'verse, but writer's block has been plaguing me bad :S
> 
> Apologies for not responding to comments in the last chapter. Please do not doubt that I treasure each and every one. Often, it's your comments that spur me on to write.

Morning light hit his closed eyelids, turning the blackness into red and rousing him from his sleep.

 

He spent a good half minute after that reorienting himself to wakefulness because… Well, because he shouldn’t be waking up at all when he didn’t remember going to sleep in the first place, and most especially not to morning light when his last memory was at the late afternoon sun. If anything, he should be waking up to Bors and Gawain escorting him to the mansion for Arthur’s sentencing.

 

He also shouldn’t be waking up in a fairly nice hotel room.

 

On instinct, his hand flew beneath the bed to retrieve his nearest gun, forgetting that he wasn’t at home in his alarm. In the next moment, he snapped his head around the room, cataloguing everything he could get his eyes on, from his own PJs he didn’t remember putting on to the logo of the hotel on the stationary beside the bed. It told him that he was just outside East London in a small-ish three star hotel that he was familiar with in passing.

 

A black bag sat unassumingly on the desk chair, and Eggsy scrambled out of bed to snatch it, scrabbling through in a desperate search for concrete information, but only finding his own belongings--shirts, pants, jackets, shoes, toiletries--inside. Convenient, but ultimately useless.

 

He was about to consider the merits of scaling down the building wall via the window versus braving whatever lay outside the door, armourless and weaponless though he may be, when a voice spoke suddenly from behind him.

 

“I took the liberty of packing your essentials,” it said. 

 

His training-honed instincts screamed at him to turn _now_ and put his defenses up because any stranger able to sneak up on a trained spy was dangerous, but his heart froze mid-beat and his body along with it because he _knew_ that voice. He _knew_ it like he knew how many bullets fit into his favorite gun and how many stab wounds it took to kill a person.

 

He knew it because he spent many a night curled up with a bottle of Cuervo and past mission feeds, memorizing every lilt, every stress, every intonation in it, and even more nights than that dreaming and daydreaming about it.

 

It was the voice that got him through tough missions, and the voice that broke down his defenses when he was home alone. It was the voice that lulled him to sleep during sleepless nights, and the voice that evoked in him a desire no other voice could.

 

Eggsy held perfectly still, stunned and maybe a little bit fearful of what he was going to see if he turned.

 

His skin prickled when the imposter (it _had_ to be an imposter) approached, and the Merlin in his mind screamed at him to _move_ and to _stop being a fucking idiot, Unwin, protect yourself_! But still, he was frozen.

 

A warm breath ghosted over the skin of his neck and a body brushed up against his back, only the barest of touches as though the other man was as afraid as Eggsy felt.

 

“Eggsy,” spoke the voice again, this time in a whisper filled with affection and apprehension and remembrance and hope. Combined with the scent of _Carbone_ that had been haunting Eggsy, and he could no longer deny its existence.

 

He shut his eyes before the tears that had been burning the backs of his eyelids fell, and he whispered in a voice that was _filled_ with anguish, “ _Harry_.”

 

“Oh, my _darling_ ,” Harry answered. Arms curled around Eggsy’s shoulders and chest, and Eggsy clung right back to them, pressing himself into the broad warmth that was Harry at his back, inexplicably alive and well, and when the first sob fell from his mouth--the culmination of the shitty few weeks he’s had with Harry’s sudden reappearance as the straw that broke the camel’s back--he turned in his place and hid his face in Harry’s chest. 

 

“Shhh…” Harry murmured as his sobs continued to come. He stroked Eggsy's back and held onto him tight, his nose buried in Eggsy’s hair and his lips pressed to his temple. “I’m here... It’s all right... Let go, darling…” Platitudes that served the purpose they intended: for Eggsy to _believe_ that this was real, that Harry was here. That Harry was _alive_.

 

“You--” he gasped around a hiccup when he eventually managed to pull himself together and remind himself that he was a _spy_ , for Chrissakes, not a pining widow. “You _died_!”

 

“I’m sorry,” Harry murmured, regretful, apologetic, his hold tightening around Eggsy. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have left you. I should have come back for you. I’m sorry, Eggsy.” His voice filled Eggsy's senses, a feeling as much as it was a sound, like warmth trying to crawl through his veins. 

 

When the last of his shudders rushed through his frame, Eggsy found his voice. 

 

“Why didn’t you?” he demanded, then amended with genuine interest, “ _How_ did you?” as he finally found the fortitude to look up at Harry, to see for himself that he was well and truly alive and right there and… 

 

And not completely unscathed, it seemed.

 

His hand came up to cup the side of Harry’s face, tilting it down so that he could see what was clearly a glass eye filling the cavity that was framed with silvery scars. His fingertips traced them absently, and his mouth turned down in a frown.

 

Harry explained softly, like he was afraid that anything more than a whisper would scare Eggsy off, “The glasses were marginally bulletproof, but at point blank, the bullet’s velocity put too much stress on it. The glass separated from the frame and allowed the bullet entry through here--” He guided Eggsy’s fingertips to touch the corner of his left eye. “--And exited here.” Again, he moved Eggsy’s hand, this time to his scalp, above his ear but hidden beneath his hair. Eggsy’s breath hitched when he felt the exit wound, a divot in Harry’s skull where hair no longer grew.

 

“Neither Valentine nor his leggy sidekick had bothered to check afterwards. They left me for dead--which I quite honestly thought I was as well. I was sure the bullet had blown a hole straight through my skull and that I was experiencing my last moments on earth. 

 

“I was unconscious for a few hours until someone happened upon me outside the church and called 911. It was fortunate that they got to me first as they were able to start emergency procedures to stabilize me before the other church survivors--what few there were--started coming in for treatments themselves.

 

“I needed extensive surgery, but… well, V-Day happened. I was only fortunate that they had me alone in the prep room when it began, but by the time anyone could attend to me once more, I had already started healing. As a result, I couldn’t… I couldn’t remember a lot before or after the church. It took a whole _month_ of rehab to even learn how to talk properly again, and when I finally _did_ remember, three quarters of the year had come and gone.”

 

“You didn’t come back,” Eggsy murmured. “...Why?” He was caught exactly between the betrayal of Harry’s absence and the relief of his presence. Maybe if he could understand _why_ , he could forgive the former and revel in the latter.

 

“I planned to. I _wanted_ to, but well…” Harry lifted his right arm, showing how his fingers trembled minutely. “I’m no longer the agent I once was. I… I can’t shoot properly anymore, can’t move like I used to. I get migraines frequently, among other things. Of what use is spy that can’t function properly?” There was frustration in his eyes, pain, sadness for a thirty-year career stripped from him so harshly, regardless that it was a hazard all of them understood. The lucky ones died in the line of duty; others were left to find their places in and out of the organization.

 

“We could have helped you with that, you know we can!” Eggsy argued, not a little frustrated. “Medical could have treated you, and even if they couldn’t, there’s so much more you could have done at Kingsman, agent status aside. You’ve been with the agency for over thirty years; you could have provided knowledge and insight that not even Arthur has. Bedivere, Bors, and Kay _still_ use you as a basis for their actions and recommendations. We needed you-- _need_ you.”

 

Harry frowned and said in a decidedly calm voice, “Clearly not, seeing as Merlin left me to rot in Kentucky and didn’t even take a cursory look at the whereabouts of my corpse if he believed me dead.”

 

“Because he was busy rebuilding the world, you prick!” Eggsy shot back, shoving at Harry a bit, but Harry was unfazed. His grip only tightened around Eggsy’s hand.

 

As though he didn’t hear Eggsy at all, he added in that same calm voice, “And look at what they’ve done to you.” That stopped Eggsy’s protestations.

 

“You knew…”

 

Harry shook his head. “I didn’t know anything until Elaine’s death. Kingsman security is far too tight for anyone not currently on the inside, even against dead agents. Protocols void all clearances a day after confirmed deaths and two months after unconfirmed ones. And I wasn’t interested in investing time and effort into gaining illegal entry into the systems. But for Elaine’s attack, Kingsman didn’t have enough time to cover it up, so I caught wind of it in the news. Even though most information was unknown at the time and redacted later on, I knew it had something to do with Kingsman, so I sought you out and found you just before Bors and Gawain came to arrest you.”

 

Eggsy fumed. “They weren’t going to arrest me then, but now, they sure as fuck will since they’re gonna think I’ve gone rogue!”

 

“Thirty years as an agent, my boy,” Harry cut in smoothly in a tone of voice that was as confident as it was reassuring. “They aren’t going to get to you before we’ve managed to clear your name first.” In a mildly mocking tone, he asked, “Did you think they would have done so on your behalf? I’ve spent a bit of time looking into your new Arthur. Did it not strike you as odd that he’s been far too quick to point his finger at you?”

 

Eggsy opened his mouth to rebut that, but found that he quite honestly could not. Harry only ‘hmmm’ed because no response was necessary when both of them clearly understood that he had won on that point.

 

And then dragged the fingers of his other hand down Eggsy’s jaw on their way to pinch his chin between the thumb and forefinger.

 

There was a moment’s pause where Eggsy was confounded by the intimacy of such gesture and another moment where he recognized the tension in the line of Harry’s body, in the grip of his hands, and in the glimmer of his eyes for what it was and what it implied.

 

And then in the moment after that, Harry dragged him up into exactly the kind of kiss he’d been dreaming of receiving from him from the moment he realized he no longer saw Harry as simply his sponsor.

 

It was deep and delicious and fraught with meaningful intent. Harry’s mouth tasted heavily of tea and more mildly of scotch that only complemented the musk of his perfume. The hand holding Eggsy’s slid down his shoulder and arm to grasp his waist, pulling him closer and up against the hard line of Harry’s body, while Harry’s mouth pried open his own. 

 

It was heady, all the sensations swirling around him, fogging his mind, and Eggsy was caught between pulling back and pushing forward.

 

“I don’t understand,” he said against Harry’s mouth, his words muffled by the other’s lips and tongue and later on dissolved into moans. He wanted this--oh _how_ he wanted Harry, but they’d jumped from point B in their relationship to point fucking S with absolutely no warning whatsoever, and Eggsy was utterly, utterly left behind.

 

Harry sighed deeply into the kiss and ended it, though he deigned to relinquish even a centimeter of space between them. His breath washed over Eggsy’s lips as he spoke. “During your training, I’d resolved to ease you into the idea once you clinched the position. But then Valentine happened and everything thereafter...” 

 

There was regret in his eyes when he spoke next. “After all that, I was certain I had to give you up.” And there was also hope. “But, Eggsy, seeing you today...” He trailed off to let out another sigh. This time, a small smile played at his lips and the hand holding Eggsy’s chin released so that he could cup Eggsy’s cheek and stroke the peak of it with his thumb. The butterflies that Harry kept in his house seemed to have rehomed themselves in Eggsy’s stomach, revived by the tone of Harry’s voice and the adoration in his eyes. “You’re so beautiful, my Eggsy. You’ve always been so, but now more than ever.” He leaned close, pressing their foreheads together, and his eyes slid shut. “I’ve wanted you for the longest time. I want you more than I’ve wanted anyone ever before. _Please_ say you’ll have me.”

 

Eggsy couldn’t speak, couldn’t possibly find any words to convey an even halfway decent response to Harry’s overture, but Jesus Fucking _Christ_. Confusion or no, there was no _fucking_ way in any of the seven levels of hell that Eggsy would have said no to _that_. So instead, with the hand that was still sunk into Harry’s hair, he dragged Harry back down into a kiss that was as eager to convey his approval as Harry’s was to ask for it.

 

This time around, Harry was thoroughly _impolite_ about what he wanted.

 

He _devoured_ Eggsy, pulling him in even closer and pressing his long, hard cock right up against Eggsy’s, sliding up and down the crevice between thigh and groin and sending shivers of delicious friction through the boy, practically rutting against him right in the middle of their hotel room. Which reminded Eggsy: hotel room.

 

He carefully persuaded Harry towards the bed (not that there was much resistance to be had), being careful not to allow Harry even a hint of hesitation until he could sprawl himself over the rumpled bedsheets and shiver beneath Harry’s rapacious gaze.

 

“You don’t just have to look, y’ know,” Eggsy murmured, reaching out to beckon Harry towards him when the older man simply stared.

 

Harry caught both his wrists as he obediently sunk down on top of Eggsy as invited, straddling his hips. He lifted both of Eggsy’s arms over his head and pinned them together with one hand while his other traced a path down his chest, flicking the buttons of his pajamas out of their holes as he went.

 

“Gorgeous boy,” he murmured, voice leaden with ardour that pinned Eggsy down almost as effectively as his hands and hips did. And then Harry rolled his cock against Eggsy’s in a single, sinuous motion and all mental processes shut down after that.

 

“ _Harry_ ,” Eggsy hissed, desperate as he lifted his whole being up into Harry’s.

 

“Shush, darling, yes,” Harry murmured. He pushed Eggsy’s pajama bottoms down to his knees without much forethought and grasped tightly at his engorged cock, wrenching out of Eggsy a cry that bordered on pain for how much he wanted to come. 

 

The mere thought of Harry’s hand on him had him begging, “ _Please_!” and trying to thrust up into the tight grip, fighting against the legs that pinned him down.

 

“I will, I will, yes,” was Harry’s response along with a twist of his wrist that made Eggsy wail.

 

Each touch, each kiss, each murmured endearment and polite filth filled in the gaping hole in his chest where his heart used to be before Harry took it with him to Kentucky. It left him with such a profound sense of relief that Eggsy wasn’t quite sure the tears that leaked out of the corners of his eyes were due to the spectacular handjob Harry was giving him.

 

“Please don’t leave,” he whispered breathlessly, desperately, easily even through the waves of pleasure that continued to pound him.

 

For a moment, Harry paused. His hand on Eggsy stilled, and his body froze. It lasted no longer than a few seconds, but it allowed Eggsy enough time to open his eyes and see on Harry’s face a violent _pleasure_ that was quickly joined by ferocious determination.

 

And then his mouth was seized in a brutal kiss that he returned with equal fervour while Harry stripped his cock with heightened vigour.

 

“Never,” was Harry’s vow poured into his mouth, mingling with Eggsy’s whimpers and wails and creating a melody as powerful as Beethoven’s fifth. “Never, my love. I’ll never leave you,” he continued to promise while Eggsy’s orgasm crested between them. “I’ll never let you go, Eggsy Unwin. You’re mine, darling, and I, yours.”

 

Such _bliss_ was given by Harry’s hand on his cock, that Eggsy only half heard the words offered to him. Nevertheless, the intent behind them was conveyed quite clearly by the grip on his cock and on his wrists: tight, unbreakable, sure.

 

Harry was his and he was Harry’s, and as long as he remembered that, he would survive whatever challenges thrown at him.

**Author's Note:**

> Follow me on [tumblr](http://renai-chan.tumblr.com) (fair warning: I am a boring Tumblrer)!


End file.
